Roommates
by epcot97
Summary: As she begins life after University, Marinette runs into trouble finding an affordable apartment close to her new job. Fortunately, Chat comes up with a plan to help her start out her purrfessional career on the right paw – with one tiny little catch: he's her roommate. Starts as MariChat! (Updates every Wednesday)
1. Roommates

_Special Author's Note: _

_This series began as a one-shot I wrote for the MariChatMay 2019 challenge that wondered what life would be like if our two favorite characters decided to share an apartment. That blossomed into five additional stories, creating an arc covering the first two years of their time together as roommates. I have to admit to being surprised at the reaction to the concept – even allowing for the conceit that Chat could even keep his identity a secret for that length of a time from the woman he loves – but it planted a seed in my creative brain to tie the six stories into a wider narrative similar to the work I'd done on _What Came Before He Knew Her_. _

_What you are about to start is a variation on that same theme from _What Came Before He Knew Her_, namely watching from Chat's standpoint as he deepens his relationship with Marinette – and, ultimately, Ladybug. I've included the original chapters written for the May, June and July 2019 prompts (with permission from my partners on those projects), though they have been reworked slightly to fit a longer narrative._

_Our characters have been aged up for this story and exist in the universe where events from the first three seasons of _Miraculous_ have taken place. This is but one possible view of what twentysomething versions of Chat and Marinette might be like.  
_

_And as always, I have no ownership of these amazingly intriguing characters, nor any other part of _Miraculous.

* * *

**One: Roommates**

As we got ready to graduate from University, I became aware that Marinette had run into difficulty finding an apartment that a struggling fashion designer would be able to afford when she confided that factoid to Chat during one of my nocturnal visits to her at the Bakery. She was doubly worried since she started work at Chateau Le Blanc as a junior designer a few days after graduation, and wanted the issue of housing settled well before then.

"But why don't you stay here?" I asked. "I'm sure your parents would be fine with you living with them until you got yourself on your own two paws."

She sighed. "Maman said as much to me, Chat. But it's time for me to spread my wings. I need to be on my own, even it happens to be an apartment just down the street." She turned forlornly back to her tablet, where she'd been scrolling through apartment vacancies. "Well, at these prices, probably two districts over."

I popped down from where I'd been sitting on the railing and cuddled up next to her, my tail snaking around her waist. "Which one do you like the best?" I asked casually, a devious plan starting to form in my cat brain.

"Well, I can only afford-"

"Furget that for a moment, Purrincess," I interrupted. "If money were no object, which one tickles your fancy?"

Marinette looked at me. "Chat, what are you doing?"

"Me?" I asked innocently. "Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Why do you ask?"

"I think thee doth protest too much." She turned back to the tablet and scrolled. "This one. The views are magnificent, and it's one Metro stop away from my new office."

My masked green eyes went wide. It was a two bedroom flat with views of the Tower. I looked back at her. "Excellent taste, Princess," I nodded, having noted it was a corner unit, with separate balconies.

She sighed. "I'd have to have hit the big time in order to afford that," she said in a desultory fashion.

We looked through the listings a bit longer and then, after a luxurious stretch I could only do while transformed, I bid her adieu. "Early morning for this cat," I said apologetically.

Marinette looked at me. "Really?" she asked, and looked serious for a moment. "Chat, you don't have to answer this, but do you… _do_ something as your alter-ego? Or are you some rich playboy waiting around for the next akuma attack?"

I smiled my wicked Chat smile at her as I stood atop the railing to her balcony. "You're right," I said as I started to fall over backwards. "I don't have to answer that…"

Her question had been a bit too close to home. For both were true: as Adrien, I'd continued to model through college and had become something of a worldwide sensation (if I do say so myself). It had paid the bills for school and left me with a handsome bank balance – over and above my "rich playboy" trust fund. I suspected I'd be able to write my own ticket as a model for another five or six years before being supplanted by some new, young thing and had made some strategic investments to protect myself.

I made another the following morning.

That next evening, after wrapping a rather hostile akuma with internet trust issues (he'd gone by the name Tin Foil Hat Tom), I dropped by the Bakery and found Marinette still flipping through the apartment listings. I knew she was unhappy by the half-empty baking tray of macaroons.

"Princess," I said, as I landed on my favorite chimney flue, and then dropped down to the railing that overlooked her.

"Hey Chat," she said, distractedly.

"Wanna go for a walk?" I asked. "This kitty needs to stretch his legs."

"Not really," she replied, still scrolling. "I've only got a few days until graduation, and I really need to nail down something."

I plopped down beside her, knowing there was no way for me to tell her I'd be graduating the same day. "C'mon, let me cheer you up with an ice cream or something."

"I'm not in the mood, Chat," she said a bit sharply.

That only egged me on. I dropped my blond mane into her shoulder and started to rub my head against her, allowing a deep rumble of a purr to appear. She tried to fend me off, but in the end, I wound up atop her tablet, making a point of examining my claws while continuing to purr.

Marinette tried to stay angry but the smile wouldn't stay hidden; she finally reached behind my ear and scratched the one spot that drove me wild. Her touch could always melt me. I cracked open a masked green eye. "That's more like it," I said. "Now, you're coming with me, 'kay?"

"Fine," she smiled. "Where are we going?"

"Never you mind that, Purrincess,"' I said, standing up and retrieving my baton. Wrapping one arm around her, I leapt for the railing. "Please keep all hands, arms, legs and small children inside the ride at all times."

"Oh Dear Lord," she laughed as she tightened her grip around my chest.

I vaulted into the night and tried to obfuscate the path to her favored apartment. It was another moon-filled sky in Paris, with the white glow reflecting off of every surface and bringing unusual shadows to the city. It felt brighter and more cheery than normal to me, too, though it was likely just my happiness that I'd be fulfilling a desire for my soulmate.

We came around the final building and I carefully helicoptered onto the balcony that faced the Tower. I'd left the lights on from my visit earlier in the day, which created a homey, welcoming feel to the space.

Marinette unwrapped herself from me, slack jawed. "Tell me this isn't what I think it is?"

I unzipped a costume pocket and produced two sets of keys. "Happy Graduation, Princess," I said, handing her a set, but snatching it away before she could take them. "There is, however, a catch or two."

She looked at me. "I can't afford this, Chat," she said.

"It's taken care of," I said. "Now do you want to hear my terms?"

"Wait, what do you mean 'it's taken care of?'" she asked. "What did you do?"

"Just what it sounds like," I said, smiling. "You have to allow this cat of mystery _some_ secrets."

Marinette looked at me, hard. "Is this legal?"

"I'm hurt you'd think otherwise," I said good naturedly. "But yes."

"Then _how_ is this possible?"

"If it will help ease your mind, my alter-ego came into… some extra cash, as it were. And I figured out the best way to put it to use."

She continued to look at me. "But there are strings attached."

I nodded. "I want you to go into this with all of the facts."

"All right," she said, crossing her arms and raising an eyebrow. "I'm not saying yes, yet, but I am intrigued."

"Okay," I said, as I slid open the balcony door. It led into one of the two master suites. I had carefully staged it with furniture I knew she would like and was rewarded with a quick intake of breath. I hid my smile as I turned and led her through to the main space.

A modest kitchen filled with professional grade appliances was in the rear, with a full compliment of professional cooking equipment hanging from the ceiling. Two (and only two) barstools sat at one end of the island that separated the kitchen from the living room, where two place settings were awaiting us; a small Dupain-Cheng cake was waiting to be carved up. I continued her past that toward the main sitting area, where a couch and low coffee table were tastefully arranged to make the most of the floor-to-ceiling windows that faced the Tower.

And in the corner, a full set of design equipment was sitting, including a professional sewing machine, a mock torso, and whiteboard to one side and a massive 27" iMac Pro on flat design desk on the other. I'd queued up a few action shots of yours truly as part of the screensaver.

I led her to the couch, and she sat down; I perched, cat-like, on the coffee table, still holding her hand. "Condition one: you'll become the best fashion designer in Paris."

"Really?" she rolled her eyes. "And how am I going to do that?"

"This space feels like it would be conducive to creativity," I said. "And if you get stuck, that kitchen back there will let you work out your angst."

She nodded. "You've given this a lot of thought, Chat."

"I have." I grinned. "Condition two: once you are financial stable, you can split the expenses with me."

Marinette nodded again. "That seems fair…" she trailed off, eyes widening. "Wait just a moment – are you saying what I think you are saying?"

I grinned wider. "That's the third condition," I said. "I'm your roommate."

She stared at me. "You as in _Chat_ you? Or your alter-ego?"

I'd thought about that all day. Even after close to eight years of working side-by-side with Ladybug, she had still insisted on anonymity – between us, and with anyone we were close to. I knew if I revealed who I truly was to Marinette, it would break an old promise to Ladybug. As much as I loved Marinette, I valued Ladybug's friendship too much to do it.

Someday, the time would be right. It just wasn't tonight.

"Me. As Chat." I winked. "I empty my own litterbox, in case you were wondering."

Her eyes widened. "How _exactly_ is that going to work?"

"The litterbox? Well—"

"Not that, _kitty_," she said, exasperated. "You, staying here, as Chat."

I squeezed her hand. "I don't know," I said honestly. "But I have a _feline_ it will work out just fine."

She rolled her eyes. "With puns like that, no."

I held out the keys. "I don't expect an answer tonight, and it's totally okay for you to say 'Thanks, Chat, but I'll pass.'" I looked at her, and softly added. "You know I love you, and I just want you to be happy. That's it. Nothing else."

Marinette's deep blue eyes connected with my masked green ones. I watched as she considered everything, weighing the pros and cons of (let's be honest) potentially moving in with a man she really didn't know. And couldn't know.

Actually, that wasn't entirely true. We'd been seeing each other nightly on that patio over the Bakery for years now, and more regularly in other places throughout the city, though for the most part, we'd kept the relationship on the down low. I knew we'd moved beyond friendship into something more, and also knew I'd probably been more honest with her while wearing the Chat mask than any of my interactions with her as Adrien. So, she perhaps didn't know the _name_ of the person beneath the mask, but she did know _me_.

I could see from her eyes, she had come to the same conclusion.

She reached for the keys. "When do we move in?" she asked.

"As soon as you want," I replied. "I'm already here," I laughed, indicating my costume, "since I didn't have a lot of things to unpack." I inclined my head toward the room we'd come in from. "That one is yours; I'll take the one on this side so you won't have to hear me come and go in the dead of night."

Her eyes widened, and she nodded. "I suppose you can't come up through the lobby," she said.

"Not my first choice, no." I paused. "I'm happy to come with you to break the news to your parents."

She smiled. "I'm not sure that would be helpful. I'll have enough trouble telling them I'm moving in with a guy let alone one who runs around in a cat costume."

I sat back. "They know me, though," I said defensively.

"I'm pulling your paw, Chat," she said. "But I can handle that on my own."

We stood up. "Take me back?" she asked.

"Absolutely," I said, pausing. "Is this what you want, truly?" I asked, worried slightly that she felt even a tiny bit of pressure from me. "I'm not kidding – it's okay for you to tell me to go jump in the Seine."

Marinette turned toward me. "Let me answer that, Chat," she said, and pulled me into an embrace topped off by deep, passionate kiss. My toes curled and we ultimately came up for air.

"I'll take that as a 'yes,'" I said happily.


	2. First Days

**Two: First Days**

_Authors Note: It may sound funny, but as I started to expand the Roommates series for our writing prompts, I had all sorts of these "in between" vignettes floating around in my writer's brain. Some of the themes made their way into the stories that were published, but others I stashed with the hope I'd be able to flesh them out further. This is one of them - a peek at how Mari and Chat get through their first week together. Suffice it to say Plagg is not especially happy. -ep_

* * *

Not much changed for me after graduation. I was already an employee of House of Gabriel, in addition to being represented by a worldwide modelling agency based in Paris. On both counts, I'd had a pretty full schedule of work from the moment I'd been able to be propped up in front of a camera. I might be a bit older, but for the most part, the essentials of the modelling portion of my career hadn't changed much. I had to hold the position I was told to take for hours on end, emote on command, maintain a nearly impossible to maintain body shape and always, _always_look gorgeous.

Marinette, on the other hand, had never worked anywhere more formal than her parent's bakery. Well, that wasn't entirely accurate: Chat had pulled a string or two for her at House of Gabriel, scoring an internship in the design department that allowed her to get a little bit of experience under her belt. It was far enough off the radar of my Father that he'd not been able to interfere with it in any way; similarly, it didn't necessarily have her come into contact with Adrien – at least, not enough for her to know who had pulled said string.

There had been about a week between graduation and her first day at Chateau Le Blanc. Knowing how stressed out she was likely to become, I'd cleared my schedule completely and then helped her move what little she wanted from her parent's place to our new apartment. We then began a carefully choreographed set of outings for the rest of the week, designed to take her mind off her first day. The hoodie and sweats combo I had to wear when we were out in public became a sort of running joke between the two of us, although she also promised to knit me something a bit more becoming once she'd settled into her new job.

Retiring to my suite the evening prior to her first day, I leaned my costumed back against the door and prayed to the fashion gods that Marinette's first day was full of firsts, exciting, and, with luck, uneventful. Having lived inside the fashion industry for my entire life, I was well aware how nasty the environment could get, and was prepared to help her through the worst moments that I knew were ahead of her.

I flipped over to my bed and folded myself into my patient cat-stance. I was still feeling my way through the whole apartment situation; living fulltime as Chat was proving to be more challenging than I had realized. While I trusted Marinette implicitly, I hadn't quite decided when it would be safe for me to drop my transformation and for how long. For the first week, I'd essentially holed up in the back of the closet in the bathroom of my suite two or three times a day, taking just enough time to feed Plagg and apologize yet again for the situation I had created. My hope was that once Marinette started her nine-to-five routine, and on days when I didn't have anything scheduled, I'd be able to let Plagg loose longer. Days that I was working would be even better for him.

But for now, I'd taken to sleeping as Chat. Just in case.

I awoke early on Marinette's first Monday, though in truth I hadn't really slept at all. I was by parts excited for my girlfriend and her new start, but also wracked with guilt for (possibly) misusing my Miraculous in order to keep up my end of the bargain. I'd also managed to shred my third set of sheets with my claws, too.

Rolling out of bed, I leapt to my door and then crossed to the kitchen. I'd prepped ingredients for omelets the night before and pulled everything out of the fridge. As I removed the cellophane wrapping from the egg mixture, my feline ears picked up movement in Marinette's suite. That was my cue to warm up the range and get down to the business of sending my beloved out into the world with a full tummy.

Marinette appeared about ten minutes later and laughed when she saw me wearing her "This Kitty is a Pure Bread" apron, a gift she had made for me years earlier during cooking lessons she had provided. Having had a personal chef for most of my life up to that point, teaching me my way around the kitchen had been a tall order, but one of many events in our history together that had solidified our feelings for each other.

Sliding onto one of the two barstools, she sniffed the air appreciatively as I folded her omelet. "Coffee, tea or orange juice," I asked.

"Juice," she said. "Can I expect this sort of treatment every morning?"

"I live to serve," I laughed, as I slid the egg concoction onto a plate and handed it to her. "But it also depends on my schedule. You're in luck this week: I'll be home most mornings."

She dug into her spinach-and-ham omelet and made murmurs of gratitude while I poured her a glass of orange juice. "You never told me what you do for a living, Chat," she said between bites.

"I know," I said as I slid my own omelet onto a plate and then started eating on the other side of the island bar. "I can't really tell you much at this point other than to say I have a job – well, technically two – and it has irregular hours and occasional travel."

She nodded. "I get it. I was just curious."

I smiled back at her. "I purromise you'll always know my schedule, even though you might not always know where I am. And you'll always be able to call me if needed, though there may be times when I can't transform to _take_your call." I smiled wider. "Or, perhaps, places where Chat Noir really shouldn't be."

Marinette's phone chirped and I raised a masked eyebrow. "It's my 'leave now or be late' alarm," she said sheepishly.

"I can help," I said, pulling off my apron. "C'mon, let me give the girl of my dreams a lift to her first day."

"Chat—"

I leapt over the counter and swept her into my arms. "Not taking 'no' for an answer," I said, touching my nose to hers before kissing her deeply. "Go get ready and I'll wait for you on the balcony."

A few minutes later, I was soaring through the early morning Parisian sky with Marinette holding on around my midsection. It was early enough that most commuters were not looking up and witnessing my unusual payload, but if they had, I wouldn't have cared. It was my own way to be part of her important first moments. About a block out from the building housing Chateau Le Blanc, I found a nice, quiet alleyway and descended gently to it on the baton. Marinette unwound herself from me, and I turned for one last kiss.

"Knock 'em out, Princess," I encouraged. "Do you want me to pick you up after work?"

She leaned up and ran a finger along the edge of my mask. "No, kitty," she said. "I want to save that for a special occasion."

"But this _is _a special occasion!" I pointed out, eyes wide.

"Which part?" she teased. "My first day as a professional? Or getting dropped off at work by my superhero boyfriend?"

"But—" I spluttered.

Marinette tapped a finger to my lips. "I'll see you back at the apartment tonight." She kissed me again and inserted herself into the crowd heading toward the building.

I watched her form recede and sighed, then rode my baton back up to a rooftop overlooking the entranceway plaza for the building. Marinette had opted for a more professional look and had not worn her signature pigtails, making it a bit more difficult for me to pick her out of the crowd. But she still loved her pink palette, and I quickly locked feline eyes on her and hung around long enough to see her enter the lobby and head for the elevators.

_I wish you all the luck in the world_, I thought.

I had a ten o'clock call across the city for a catalogue spread, so reluctantly, I turned and headed home to clear out the breakfast dishes and get ready for work myself. The shoot went faster than I expected, so on the way back, I splurged and order takeout at my favorite Italian bistro, then splurged further on an expensive bottle of red wine I knew Marinette favored (but would never ask me to buy).

Setting the takeout in the oven on low, I dashed to my suite and de-transformed, giving Plagg a few minutes to glare at me before retiring to the corner of the room he'd staked out for himself. I ran through the shower, trying to scrub away the cosmetic factory I seemed to get applied to my body whenever I was going on film.

Hair still damp, I emerged from the bathroom in a nondescript sleeveless t-shirt and gym shorts to find Plagg was still in poor spirits. I couldn't blame him, but I also felt a bit trapped by my promise. "Plagg-" I started, only to hear the front door open.

"Chat? Are you home?"

"I am!" I said, hoping my normal voice didn't throw her. Chat had a slightly different timbre than Adrien. "Out in five!" I turned back to Plagg. "Look, I'll figure this out," I whispered. "Can we talk about it later tonight?"

Plagg rolled his eyes. "Sure, kid," he said. "Whatever."

Waves of guilt rolled over me again. "Plagg – claws out!"

After the flash of transformation cleared, I headed out to the kitchen and started getting dinner out of the oven. My feline ears heard her rummaging around in her suite, and she appeared in comfy clothes, hair up in a casual bun. Using my claws, I uncorked the wine and decanted a glass for her. "Tell me all about it," I said as I slid the glass toward her.

As the evening progressed, I received a blow-by-blow description of what she'd experienced. Her pure joy at actually working in her dream field infused all of her observations and had me likewise giddy with the excitement that her first day had gone so well.

We curled up together on the couch facing the floor-to-ceiling windows, watching the lights come on over the Eiffel Tower and generally just soaking up each other. My tail had curled around her waist, and she'd planted her head on my chest. I knew my purring had put her to sleep, but I was reluctant to spoil the moment.

It felt like a portentous sign of things to come.


	3. Settling Details

**Three: Settling Details**

_Author's Note: One of the questions I received most during the initial run of the _Roommates_ stories was how Plagg was handling Adrien's rather extreme requests of him. My response generally was along the lines that the two of them - Adrien and Plagg - had a meeting of the minds, though none of the prompts allowed for more than a scene alluding to this hypothetical discussion. Naturally, I _did_ have a story in mind as I wrote the series, and this chapter is my chance to share it. -ep_

* * *

By the end of my third week in the apartment, I experienced a bit of a Plagg emergency.

To be fair, it was one of my own making. Staying transformed as Chat Noir nearly twenty-four hours a day had made him irritable, to put it mildly. So much so, that any chance he had to escape the ring was an opportunity to cause me somewhat well-deserved grief. That particular Thursday turned out to be one for the ages.

I'd had a grueling photoshoot at the park close to the Dupain-Cheng Bakery, with an early six o'clock call for hair and makeup. It was one of the few mornings I'd not been around to send Marinette off to work, and I found myself feeling a bit melancholy at the change in our pattern as I dropped into an alley a few blocks from the park to change from Chat Noir to Adrien.

Being the first time he'd been freed in nearly eight hours, Plagg had ignored me completely despite my offer of cheese, and had waited until the last possible moment to hide in my pocket as I approached the set. Once in the trailer, he'd phased directly into the fridge where I'd ensured camembert had been stashed (it was one of the more unusual addenda in a model contract, according to my agent) and remained there the entire time I was working.

He didn't even come out when I was in the chair for the final time, some ten hours later, having the makeup removed and trying to get my hair back into some semblance of its usual look. I waited until my makeup artist left before standing and heading toward the fridge.

Assuming I'd need to bribe him to come out, I reached for the extremely expensive camembert I'd stashed in my shirt only to find an empty wrapper. The tiny rascal had cleaned me out while I was on set in another change of clothes; I smiled, wryly, and tapped on the fridge.

"Time to go home," I said cheerfully.

I heard a harrumph.

"C'mon, Plagg. I promised Marinette I'd bring home something from the Bakery tonight," I said, glancing at the clock on the wall. "If we don't leave soon, we'll be late."

He may or may not have said something; I had to press an ear against the fridge to ensure he was even in there. I tried to pull the door open and found he'd managed to lock it from the inside, somehow.

It wasn't the first time, and I sat back on my haunches, reluctant to pull the only card I had. "Plagg, please," I pleaded, not above adding a little whining. "I'm willing to put the good stuff on auto reorder."

Still not hearing anything, I heaved another sigh. "Fine. Plagg – claws out!"

A _very_ unhappy Plagg phased out of the fridge and directly into the ring on my outstretched hand; I felt the wave of transformation wash over me, and found myself crouched on the floor in my magic black leather costume. Unsure if he could hear me, I twisted the ring so I could look directly at the paw print. "We'll discuss this tonight, I promise," I said quietly. "I know this isn't the optimal way to handle our arrangement with Marinette. We'll figure out something that works for both of us."

The ring, of course, didn't reply.

Sliding the venetian blinds to the side, I ensured the coast was clear before popping out of the side door to the trailer and hurling myself into the air; I made a quick stop at the Bakery to pick up some beef stew and fresh rolls (yes, Chat Noir was a frequent shopper there) before lifting myself up to the rooftops on the baton and running along my highway in the sky to our apartment.

I could see Marinette in the kitchen as I approached, so I landed on our main balcony and tapped a claw against the glass. She looked up and smiled as I raised the recognizable bags from her parent's Bakery and came over to slide open the door.

Kissing her, I asked: "Miss me?"

"Always, Chaton," she smiled as she kissed me back. "Now, let's get this dished up—"

We didn't make it past the balcony, for both of our eyes fell on the widescreen television she'd muted. The chyron across the bottom said it all: an active akuma had been sighted a few blocks from the Grand Palais. I sighed, for a long day was about to get longer. "Well, mon cherie, don't wait for me," I said, handing her the bags and heading toward the balcony. "Just leave me something in the oven?"

"No promises," she smiled. "Be safe!"

I arrived on site, and Ladybug joined me almost immediately. "You must have been close by," I observed, raising a masked eyebrow. "Shopping for a gift to give me, Milady?" I asked, nodding toward the expensive row of jewelers across the street from where we were perched.

"Hardly," she replied, arching her own eyebrow back at me.

I smiled back at her. "Look, if you have a moment after we're done, I need a few minutes to chat," I said suddenly. I'd been dithering on how to broach the topic of Marinette with her for some time.

"We'll see," she demurred as we got down to business with the akuma.

While it wound up being fairly easy to clear, it had nonetheless taken both her Lucky Charm and my Cataclysm to close it out. Standing there watching the last of her ladybugs do their thing, I raised my paw to her for our traditional fist pump. "Pound it!" I said, then turned to find she was already spinning up her yo-yo to go.

"Sorry," she smiled, before tapping my paw perfunctorily. "Got to bug out!" she cried as she sailed into the night, trailing her chirping earrings.

I understood and quasi-waved to her retreating form. My own ring chirping, I vaulted over to an alley that was close at hand to de-transform and feed Plagg, only to remember as I landed in my crouch that he'd eaten me out of house and home. My masked eyes widened with the realization that my cheese supply was at the apartment. Looking at my ring again, I judged I had just enough time to get back as Chat, but I'd have to risk taking a direct route.

Hopping into the air and riding my baton up, I leapt from the first roof I hit into helicopter mode to land on the next one, then ran as fast as my feline legs could go. I thought I might have caught a flash of red several buildings away from me, and had a brief desire to alter my course and give Ladybug chase. But the insistent chirping of my ring relegated me to hopping around chimneys and hurdling satellite dishes en route to home.

I landed on my own balcony and rolled into the bedroom just as my de-transformation hit. Plagg appeared in front of me as I crouched on the floor, his nearly permanent frown the first thing I saw. "Hey," I said amenably. "I did promise cheese."

Huffing, he turned and moved to his corner, retrieving a full wheel of the good stuff from his stash.

"Chat?" I heard from the kitchen. "Are you back?"

"Yes!" I called back, trying to pitch my Adrien voice down a bit. "Out shortly."

"Take your time," she replied. "I may or may not have burned dinner and am re-making it now."

I moved to the door. "What? It was takeout!"

I heard a rueful chuckle. "_Was_ being the operative word. I put in into the oven to stay warm and dozed off on the couch. I ran by the market and picked up makings for coq au vin, if that's okay?"

"Are you kidding?" I replied, mouth watering. "I can taste it already."

"You have time for a shower," she told me, knowing that I often snuck one in when returning from "work." I heard her start humming as she pulled cooking items out of the cabinets and decided to take her up on the offer.

After scrubbing away the day's activities, I wandered back into my bedroom. Toweling my still-damp hair, I'd dressed in a black t-shirt emblazoned with "claws out" in dayglo green and mis-matched Ladybug gym shorts, both of which I'd found online. Plagg was still in his corner, but having feasted on his cheese, seemed less petulant than he had been earlier.

Now seemed like the time to have our chat.

Channeling Chat, I hopped onto my bed and perched, cross-legged, then tossed the towel into the hamper beside him. "Can we talk?" I asked.

"Whatever." He eyed me over his cheese but didn't phase away. I took that as a good sign.

"Look," I started. "I realize this is a nutty situation. But I made a promise to Ladybug; if I want to be with Marinette, this is the only way." I paused. "It's not furever. Someday, I'll be able to reveal who I am."

He donned a knowing smirk but said nothing.

"You told me a long time ago I could stay transformed indefinitely, unless I use Cataclysm. Has that changed?"

"No," he said after a moment of consideration.

"So I'm not injuring you in any way?" I asked, for I _was_ concerned for my kwami. "Staying transformed?"

He shook his head. "But you try staying cooped up in a jewel for hours on end," he added, narrowing his tiny green feline eyes. "It's not like I have a choice, do I?" He meaningfully returned his attention to eating.

I flopped down on my stomach so I could be closer to him. "You are as much a part of this as I am," I said genuinely. "I want you to be happy, too."

Plagg looked up at me, and for a moment, I saw something that might have passed for wistfulness slide across his face.

"How about this. I've already ruined six sets of sheets, so starting tonight, I'll de-transform for bed. You can do whatever you want—"

I saw something flash across his face.

"—_within reason_, while I'm sleeping, so long as you're close enough that I can transform quickly if we have to deal with an akuma."

He nodded.

"You already have the run of my dressing room whenever I'm on a shoot. Oh, and next time, leave me the emergency cheese, please?"

That made him laugh. "No promises, kid."

I smiled. "I've got an on-location catalog gig on the Riviera in a few weeks," I continued. "Chat won't be called on for a few days, I would think, so you'll have a nice long vacation." I paused. "Unless I have to call Marinette, of course."

He nodded again. "That's fair," he said. "But I would prefer more breaks, especially on weekends."

"I can work on that," I said. "I still have that costume Father made for the music video…" I started thoughtfully.

Plagg started laughing, and I leveled a glare at him. "Seriously?" he asked, chortling in a way he'd not done since we'd moved in. He floated over to me, cheese in one paw, and tapped the other against my bicep. "You're not fourteen anymore, Adrien. I doubt no matter how good the construction of that suit, the seams wouldn't hold up against your, uh, current body shape."

That made me smile. Years of being Chat Noir had left me with an extremely well-defined set of muscles, ones that had enhanced my modelling options in recent years. I was still slight, though, and was more on the dancer side of the spectrum than full-on weightlifter. "Good point," I laughed. "We'll come up with something."

"Chat?" I heard from the kitchen. "About ready. Come open the wine, will you?"

"Be right out," I hollered, the turned back to my little friend. "Is that a good start?" I asked. "I promise to keep looking for opportunities to spring you, and just as soon as I can reveal myself to her, I will."

Taking on the inscrutable expression I knew meant hijinks would soon follow, he nodded one final time. "That will work, for now."

"Good. Now, I'd like to have dinner with my girlfriend, if you don't mind."

"Go for it, kid."

"Plagg – claws out!"

Moments later, I emerged from my bedroom and moved to the wine bottle Marinette had placed on the counter. As I stuck a claw into the cork, the wondrous smells of her handiwork filled my feline nose.

And then it wrinkled.

"Did you… use camembert tonight?" I asked, my masked feline eyes going wide.

"No," she said evasively. "Why?"

"Nothing," I said, sniffing the air again.

I was sure I'd picked up the scent, but it was gone now; I wrote it off as having just spent time with Plagg and his stash, and settled in to enjoy the lovely dinner she'd prepared.


	4. Cheesy

**Four: Cheesy**

_Author's Note: My frequent collaborator, ChubbyUnicornMama, inserted a several lines into a co-written Roommates story we did during LadrienJune2019 that hinted at Marinette feeding Plagg behind Chat's back. There wasn't time or space to explore that further in the original piece, but the possibility of writing how Chat would react to discovering that was too good to pass up. -ep  
_

* * *

After that initial blast of camembert, I started to smell it more frequently, especially when Marinette did the grocery shopping. The smell was bad enough when I was Adrien; as Chat, with my enhanced feline sense of smell, it was nearly nauseating. How Plagg had fallen in love with it was a mystery I couldn't fathom and didn't care to solve.

I usually picked up my everyday supply from the cheese monger at the open air market halfway across the city; I figured it would be safer to have Adrien been seen far, far away from the apartment, despite there being an equally as good shop just around the corner from us. The really, really expensive stuff I had shipped to my office at House of Gabriel, much to the consternation of the mail room. It was the first time I'd enjoyed any sort of perk to being the boss's son.

Why Marinette was purchasing cheese, though, perplexed me. We definitely hadn't been using it in any of the meals we'd been preparing. I'd wracked my feline brain trying to remember if I'd ever explained where my power came from, or that I had to feed my kwami regularly. I didn't think I had, for to any normal human being, the very concept would seem a little bit sci-fi.

One evening, though, I started to get some clues as to what might be going on.

Ladybug and I had fought off a brutal akuma just as I'd gotten off work. It had been a multi-hour affair that had leveled half of Paris; I'd even spent a portion of the battle on my own in order for Ladybug to call in our extended Team Miraculous. Even with all of _them,_ though, it had taken most the evening to corner and then subdue the akuma, and I'd quite literally dragged my tail in through the balcony window when it was over.

After a plaintive "I'm back," hollered through the door, I didn't even wait for Marinette's response and collapsed into my bed. Having in the end used my Cataclysm, I just waited for the transformation to drop on its own and immediately fell asleep.

Waking up around one in the morning, I found I was starving, having missed dinner in the process of saving Paris. Throwing back my sheets, I called out to Plagg. "You're rubbing off of me, my friend. I'm hungry enough I might eat some of that cheese of yours."

There was no response from the corner where he normally slept, and without my night vision, in the darkness of the room I couldn't tell if he was just sound asleep. I snapped the light on by my bed and turned, and saw Plagg was not in his spot.

Only once before had he deserted me, and it had led to the same panic I was starting to feel again. "Plagg?"

I stood from the bed, and rustled through the laundry hamper, then checked my sock drawer. No Plagg.

"Plagg?" I called out again, a bit louder. I opened all of the drawers of my dresser, most of which were empty; he was likewise not in the walk-in closet or the bathroom.

Now I _was_ starting to panic. I went to the door, but paused; I couldn't go out into the main space without my transformation. I hurried back to the closet and dug around for sweats and a hoodie I'd not worn yet, and dug through the closet further to locate the mask that was part of the faux Chat costume. It wasn't perfect but it would have to do: if Marinette was out there, we were about to have a very interesting conversation.

Holding the mask against my face with one hand, I cracked the door open with the other. The space beyond was dark, allowing the light from my room to spill out across the tile. I quietly tip-toed into the kitchen, whispering: "Plagg? Where are you?"

I made it as far as the island when I found him. Plagg was flat on his back, snoring. His tummy was as distended as I'd ever seen it, and beside his soundly slumbering form was a heap of aluminum. Taking a cautious sniff, I realized he'd gorged himself on cheese – but not my supply.

Carefully, I removed the aluminum to the trash, and then gently slid my kwami into a palm to carry him back to our bedroom. I knew we had fought hard, but this was the first time I'd seen him so exhausted. Waves of guilt washed over me again; while I had made good on my pledge to let him roam while I slept, between the time I'd spent with Marinette in the last week and the akumas Hawkmoth had thrown at us, he'd not had a lot of downtime.

I made him a bed inside the sock drawer and carefully placed him in it, then wandered back to the kitchen for coffee and cold leftovers from the fridge. The adrenaline from my mini-panic at not finding Plagg would take some time to fade, so sleep wasn't going happen anytime soon. Instead, I folded myself as close to my patient cat stance as I could as Adrien, and kept watch over my kwami as he slept.

I was about a quarter of the way through the cheese magazine Plagg favored when he rolled over and cracked an eye at me. "Why are you up?" he asked carefully. "Is there an akuma?"

"No," I said, draining the last of my coffee. "I couldn't sleep." I lifted the magazine. "There are some interesting recopies in here. Is Marinette making any for you?"

"Two of them from the April issue," he nodded sleepily. "There's also a soup I've not had in five centuries that she's agreed to try and re-create, assuming it's possible to find all of the ingredients."

"I see," I said, arching an eyebrow.

It took a moment before both of Plagg's green eyes popped wide open. "Uh oh."

"Busted," I nodded. "I thought we were supposed to keep your existence a secret?" I asked. "And yet you appear to have decided to introduce yourself to my girlfriend. Without asking me first."

Plagg slid out from beneath the sock I'd pulled over him and then floated toward me. "First off, I make the rules. Second, I make the rules. Are we clear?"

That arched eyebrow of mine went higher. "Does that line usually work on your holders?"

Plagg frowned. "Not since the 1980s." He considered me for a moment. "Seriously, it's okay. I've been down this road a few times, kid, and I know what I'm doing. And your girlfriend out there is a one-of-a-kind keeper. She already suspected I existed and has been sneaking me cheese nearly from the moment we moved in."

The other eyebrow went up. "She has? I've only been smelling it for a few days now."

"She's been a bit… distracted… this week," Plagg said carefully. "But it's Marinette. She's going to feed anyone living under this roof."

"_I'm_ feeding you too," I pointed out. "How much cheese can one Kwami of Destruction eat?"

"Chat—"

"Is the cheese I'm getting you wrong?" I asked, worried now. I pulled out my phone and started to search for a new vendor. "I'll switch – what brand is she-"

"_Chat!_" Plagg said forcefully.

I looked up. "You never call me that," I observed.

"Hazard of the job," he laughed. "And there's nothing wrong with your cheese. And I eat it all – both are…" he paused, and then his voice got really low. "Provided with love."

I was floored. In all the years we had been together, Plagg never, _ever_ expressed his feelings. I carefully chose not to comment on it and instead said: "All right, then. So now my girlfriend knows about kwamis."

"Yes," Plagg said, though his tone was a bit odd.

"I still should talk to her about you and my powers in general. Is that okay?"

Plagg cocked his head and thought. "Yes," he said simply. "Now, get some sleep."

"Right," I said, laughing. "You gave me quite the scare earlier."

"Whaddya mean?"

"You were missing. I found you passed out on the counter in the kitchen. Overdosed on cheese."

"Oh, that," he said, waving a paw at me. "I was just resting between courses."

"Right," I said again. "G'night."

I turned off the light and managed to get some sleep among the tossed sheets, giving up around five and running through the shower. Oddly, Plagg floated into the bathroom as I was putting the finishing touches on my hair. "This is new," I said. "Usually I have to drag you out of your sock drawer."

"I'll deny this later, but I'm glad we talked last night," he said. "Now, she's making you waffles out there. Hurry up."

"Waffles?" I said. "On a weekday?"

"Yeah." He looked meaningfully at my ring. "Now?"

I laughed. "Plagg – claws out!"

A moment later, I was staring at Chat Noir in the mirror; technically, it was me, of course, but seeing myself in costume always reminded me of the deep responsibility I was entrusted with. And that I looked really good in skin-tight black leather.

My feline sense of smell immediately picked up the twin joys of fresh waffles and Canadian bacon. I trotted out and through my door to the kitchen and found Marinette with her hair up and in casual clothes, puttering around the kitchen. "Something smells divine," I enthused as I hugged her on my way to the Keurig. "What's the occasion?"

"Day off," she said. "I took a chance that you were off, too."

"I have some paperwork for-" I edited on the fly, having nearly said House of Gabriel, "—my job that I can do remotely and later tonight," I replied. "Let me make one phone call and I'm yours for the day."

"Just the day?" she teased, playfully pouting.

I twirled her around and placed a hot kiss on her. "What do you think?"

"Good to know," she laughed, releasing me and returning to the waffles.

Sipping my coffee, I thought about how I wanted to approach Plagg with Marinette. It seemed prudent not to call her out about feeding him behind my back, but I was also intensely curious how she'd figured out I had the little critter. It was hard not to be – I was a cat, after all.

I came around to the far side of the bar and slid onto one of the stools, careful to keep my tail from getting tangled. "I have an admission to make," I said, deciding on humor. "I've been hiding a relationship I'm having on the side from you."

Marinette didn't look up from where she was pouring batter into the waffle iron. "Oh?" she said.

"Yeah." I tapped a claw against my mug, hearing the _clink clink_ as I spoke. "I've never explained the whole Miraculous deal to you, have I?"

"No," she said as she closed the lid. "You've got three minutes to do so," she laughed. "And then we're ready."

I smiled. "So," I started, holding up my ring. "This is my Miraculous."

She arched an eyebrow at me. "Should you be telling me any of this?" she interrupted.

"I asked," I replied.

That garnered a double raised eyebrow of shock. "Indeed."

"Anyway," I continued, "I obviously hold the Cat Miraculous, and my partner, Ladybug, holds the Bug Miraculous."

"She has a ring, too?"

"No, each Miraculous is a different jewel. Hers happen to be earrings."

"Oh."

"Without going into crazy details, each Miraculous holder – that's me – is pared to a jewel and the kwami that powers it."

"Kwami?" she frowned.

"They are… well, tiny gods," I said, smiling, "powered by quantic energy." I turned the ring a bit so I could see the glowing paw print. "I've only met a few of them, but they all have purrsonalities that match their Miraculous. Mine is named Plagg, and he is quite the character."

"Is he responsible for your sense of humor?" she asked, eyes gleaming with amusement.

"That is all me," I laughed. "But since Plagg is quite literally a black cat, my feline antics are mostly from his influence."

"Mostly?"

I smirked. "I know how to play cat when I want to," I said.

"Indeed," she laughed.

"While transformed, Plagg essentially provides the 'power' that makes me Chat Noir. He can keep me transformed nearly indefinitely, but there are a few exceptions to that rule," I said vaguely. "When I hit one, I need to feed him fairly quickly so he can recharge, as it were."

She nodded.

"Each kwami has different requirements and tastes. Plagg happens to have a penchant for very smelly cheese. Camembert, in fact," I said, keeping my expression neutral.

"I wondered about that," she said as she opened the waffle iron.

Seeing that she wasn't about to admit that she had somehow already met my kwami, behind my back no less, I just smiled at her and accepted the plate she slid toward me. "I don't want you to be alarmed if you find him out and about after I've gone to bed," I continued. "He's mostly harmless."

"Mostly?"

I grinned. "Actually, he's a little devil. But I love him to pieces." I took a bite. "But if you ever tell him that, I will deny it to my dying day."

"Your secret is safe, Chat," she laughed. "Now, how are my waffles?"

"Extraordinary," I gushed. "Just like my girlfriend."


	5. Sunny Days

**Five: Sunny Days**

_Author's Note: Chat put it off as long as he could, but it's finally time for him to tell Ladybug about his living arrangements. Shall we listen in? This could be an interesting conversation... -ep  
_

* * *

A few days out from my beachfront photo shoot, I managed to finally snag an evening meetup with Ladybug. It had been harder than I'd expected wrangling a time to talk to her; since I knew she was about my age, I imagined she, too, had likely transitioned to this new status of "adult" and the demands that placed on our schedule. I'd never ventured more than a few inquiries as to what she did in her civilian life, knowing I was likely to get cryptic answers at best.

The meetup was to serve two purposes – first, I needed to let her know I'd have to leave Paris for a bit for my alter-ego's job, trying to be as vague as possible with the details. Depending on how well that went, I was hoping to finally bring up Marinette. I'd been delaying speaking to her about it for weeks now, but after some prodding from my girlfriend, knew it was time. Unsure how she'd take the news – I wasn't exactly asking for permission, after all – I'd picked up a dozen cannoli from my favorite Italian bistro and her double-chocolate mocha. I wasn't above bribery.

Ladybug was waiting for me when I swung down from the night sky and trotted to a stop a few meters away from her. "Milady," I said, bowing and kissing her hand as was my custom.

As I looked up again, I could see she had fixed her eyes on the coffee. "This can't be good," she laughed.

I felt the skin below my mask flame. It was true, I tended to lead with goodies when I thought she was going to be annoyed with me. "Ah, I guess it depends."

Ladybug rolled her eyes as I pulled her cup out of the carrier and handed it to her. "All right, out with it."

"Cannoli?" I offered, helpfully.

"Chat…" she said with the warning tone I'd come to know.

I sighed. "So, I need a few days off," I started. "My job requires me to work outside of Paris for a bit. I've tried to keep my travel to a minimum but this one is unavoidable."

She snagged a cannoli out of the box and munched thoughtfully. "I've never asked what you do outside of the mask, have I?"

"No, Milady," I confirmed. "Nor would you."

"True," she smiled.

A smidge of powdered sugar remained at the side of her mouth, and grinning, I gently removed it with a claw. "It'll be about a week," I said, and added, "but if you feel uncomfortable, I will find a way to cancel."

Ladybug popped the last of her first cannoli into her mouth and immediately reached for a second. I fought back a comment about the benefits of our cranked metabolism and instead wore an expectant expression. The divine smell of the ricotta filling was hard for me to ignore, but I managed to stand there without raiding the box myself.

"How far away will you be?" she asked.

"Far enough that I won't be able to get back easily or quickly."

She nodded. "To be honest, I'd assumed something like this would come up as we moved into our professional careers," she said, the first indication she'd ever given me that she had a life other than being Ladybug. "I think our Miraculous bench is deep enough we will survive without you for a bit," she grinned wickedly. "But if you are gone _too _long, I'll make good on my threat to promote Carapace."

I put a paw on my heart and screwed my masked eyes shut as if in pain. "That hurts, LB."

She laughed at my antics. "Nevertheless, I'll make sure Rena and Cap have their jewels and are on standby. Hopefully we will get by without needing you to Cataclysm something, though," she added soberly.

That did make me frown. My superpower complimented hers, of course, when freeing an akuma; we'd been creative in the past when needed, but it was always easier when I could crumble something to dust for her. "That does worry me."

"We won't know until we've gone through it once. Now is as good a time as any."

I nodded. "That brings me to my second item." I shook the box at her. "Cannoli?"

"Lordy," she said, taking her third. "The way you are plying me with food really concerns me."

I could feel my face flaming a bit – odd, since I hadn't been embarrassed in front of her in a long, long time. "Well, this one is a bit purrsonal."

Ladybug leaned against a convenient brick wall. "All right."

"So, you remember my classmate, Marinette?" I asked. I had talked about her before, especially when it started to look like our relationship was getting serious right about the time I started University.

"Your girlfriend?" she laughed. "How could I forget?"

"And here I was thinking you'd appreciate me not flirting with you when we're together."

"I can't believe I'm saying this, but there are times when I miss it, Chat," she said, smiling fondly.

"Well…" I took a deep breath. "We've decided to share an apartment together."

"You… _what_?" she asked, nearly dropping her coffee. "Not as _Chat_? Please tell me not as Chat."

"Uh… well, I never could lie to you, Milady." I paused and moved a bit closer to her. "She means the world to me, but I also made you a promise never to reveal my identity to anyone. I intend to stick by that promise until the time is right – when it's safe for her to know who I really am."

Ladybug looked at me a bit like I'd grown a second head. "You are _actually_ living with her… as _Chat_?"

"Yeah," I said, suddenly feeling a bit embarrassed. "We've managed to work it out so far, though my claws shredded a few sets of sheets and my kwami nearly stopped talking to me. But believe me, we meowed it through extensively before either one of us set foot in the space."

"I can believe that."

"I love her," I said, "and for now, this is the only way it can work. For both of us."

"Does she fully understand what it means to date you, as Chat Noir? The danger she might be in?"

I thought about that. Marinette and I had discussed that one item intensely over the course of a few evenings, for as much as I wanted the arrangement to work, I felt strongly she needed to understand that being with me brought danger to her doorstep. I'd promised to protect her, but also warned her that my enemies were likely to target her if and when it became known we were an item.

Marinette had cutely pulled out her cellphone and showed me the gallery of what where called MariChat photos on the Ladyblog and had said: "That ship sailed a while ago, Chat."

"She does," I replied to Ladybug. "But that doesn't mean I won't keep an eye on her."

"Like tonight?" Ladybug said suddenly. "I presume you left her alone to come meet with me."

"With strict instructions not to let the Big Bad Wolf through the door," I said snarkily. "She's a big girl now, Ladybug. She tends to shrug off my sincerest protectionist tendencies."

That made Ladybug smile. "Anyone who loves you and can do that is all right in my book," she said before pulling me into an unexpected quick hug. "Just keep her safe, as best as you can," she added. "I'll do what I can, too, but this is really more in your court than mine."

"It is," I agreed.

"Now," she said, snagging yet another cannoli, "explain to me fully how this apartment thing is working."

I spent the next hour going over how I came and went from the apartment, the other strategies I was taking to shield my identity from Marinette, and all sorts of housekeeping items in that vein. At length, she decided I'd taken every prudent precaution I could, both to protect Marinette and my identity.

As we stood to go, she hugged me again. "She's quite lucky to have you," she said, with what felt to me to be a trace of wistfulness. "You are truly one-of-a-kind, kitty."

"Thank you, Milady," I smiled, giving her a quick kiss on the head and taking in her warm vanilla-sugar exotic scent as I did. Then I put my arms to her shoulders. "You'll find someone worthy of you, someday, LB. I know it wasn't me, but you'll find them. I just know you will."

"I will," she said, smiling oddly at me. "G'night."

"Until we meet again, Milady," I bowed. "I'll buzz you when I am back in town?"

"Sounds like a plan."

Ten days on the French Riviera left me with a deep, deep tan that my mask couldn't hide; when Marinette saw me upon my return to the apartment, her eyes widened. I'd managed to FaceTime her a few times from my suite at the hotel they'd put me up in, but until she saw me in the fur, she'd not known I'd been on the beach.

"Wow," she said, and her eyes started to roam my costume with an appraising look. "Is it—"

"Full body, yes," I nodded, feeling a bit embarrassed to see her suddenly imagining me in skimpy beach attire. Which, actually, had been one of many items I'd been modelling.

Marinette was already holding me in the hug she'd tackled me in as I'd come through the sliding door from the balcony; she took a hand and ran a finger along my mask edge, something that I gotten rather used to her doing. "It's unfortunate this costume of yours doesn't come off," she said with an evil glint to her eye. "I'd prefer seeing the evidence with my own eyes."

I hadn't expected to rue the day I'd told her father about that tiny little aspect of my superhero persona. "Sad but true," I managed to croak.

"A girl can dream," she replied, that evil gleam getting more pronounced. It didn't help that her hand had moved upward and was now gently rubbing my feline ear; she'd discovered it was like kitty kryptonite to me fairly soon after we'd started to date.

I took a deep breath and leaned down for a kiss before attempting to extricate myself. If she went much longer, I'd be curled up in her lap, purring up a storm and oblivious to anything but her ministrations. That wouldn't do much for the House of Gabriel emails I needed to get through that evening. What was worse was the longer I spent transformed, the more I found myself responding to her as a cat.

There was no question I was pushing the envelope now.

I pulled back from the kiss. "Princess, I've got work to do…" I said.

"It can wait," she replied, and leaned up for another kiss.

She spent the rest of the evening telling me _exactly_ how much she'd missed me.


	6. The Meeting

**Six: The Meeting**

_Author's Note: During the original six-part series, I hinted that Adrien played a fairly large role at House of Gabriel, in addition to being a supermodel. As I thought about expanding the story, it occurred to me that the fashion world - especially in Paris - is pretty small; the odds that Marinette's firm would have to cross swords with House of Gabriel seemed rather good. And too good of an opportunity to pass up. -ep_

* * *

The first few days after my return from the Riviera were busy administratively for me. While I'd been frolicking on the beach, my admin at House of Gabriel had been diligent about booking me for wall-to-wall design meetings, many of which I had studiously avoided in order to, well, studiously avoid seeing Father.

We'd never seen eye-to-eye even during my teen years, and it had gotten worse when it originally looked like Adrien might be getting into a relationship with Marinette. That had faded, of course, in the face of Chat pursuing Marinette, but Father had no way to know I was still involved with her. It had the potential to be far more of a sore point now that she worked for a rival design firm. Regardless, I tried to minimize my interactions with him the minimum required by my Board of Director duties.

My inability to stay focused on House of Gabriel work, though, led to Marinette quite nearly figuring out I was Chat.

Marinette had been obsessing over a meeting her firm was to have with House of Gabriel; apparently, a design they were working on had been leaked to Father, and he'd demanded a face-to-face with her boss to demand the line be spiked as it was too close to something he'd already put out. I'd lent a thoughtful feline ear or two to her as she'd explained the mess they appeared to be in, but otherwise hadn't thought much about it.

That is, until I pulled open the glass door to our conference room and saw her sitting at the long oak table. Her back was to me as she'd been fussing with connecting her MacBook to the projector in the room; I swallowed a bit. As I also happened to be wearing a polo that day, I realized I was showcasing the rest of the golden tan on my exposed arms that she'd only glimpsed parts of below the Chat mask. I started to back out of the conference room, only to back directly into Father.

"Adrien," he said, the tone fully expressing his displeasure.

"Father," I acknowledged, stepping aside to allow him through. I tried not to raise an eyebrow; he seldom left the mansion, leaving it to an aide to prop up his visage on tablet. That meant this meeting was extremely important.

Marinette's head snapped around and caught my eyes. "Hey, Adrien," she said warmly.

I stepped over to her and placed my tablet on the table, and pulled her into a formal hug. "Long time, no see," I said, trying to sound like it _had_ been more than just a few hours since I'd seen her. "How are you doing?"

"Great," she said as the two of us stepped into a far corner of the room. Her eyes slid to the tan on my arms, then up to my face. "You've gotten some sun recently," she observed quietly.

"I wish," I smiled. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the frosty reception Father was giving Marinette's boss, and judged he might be out of earshot. "This is from the tanning bed, I'm afraid. I have a photo shoot tomorrow that requires me to look, and I quote, 'sun kissed.'" I swiveled a bit. "Do I pass?"

She raised an eyebrow. "I'd have to see the rest of you in order to make that determination," she said with a gleam to her eye.

"Speak to my agent," I laughed, allowing a bit of Chat out. "I might be available for parties."

"Indeed," she said. She glanced back at Father. "I could use one afterward. This is not going to be fun."

"I'm afraid I'm just coming up to speed," I lied, since I now knew exactly why we were all here.

"Pardon my frankness, but your father is being a jerk."

I rolled my eyes. "Tell me something I _don't_ know."

She smiled slightly. "My boss happened to have used the exact same shade of blue in something Gabriel already has out," she explained. "He wants us to kill our entire line over it."

"Blue?" I repeated, having, of course, heard this already. "Really?"

Marinette cocked her head at me, and I belatedly realized I'd just repeated the reaction I'd had as Chat. "Yeah," she confirmed.

I took a moment to look at her and saw the worry in her face. Her firm was much smaller than ours, but on the rise; I knew Father was concerned and was likely using this situation to try and stamp out a competitor. I had a more pragmatic view of the market, one he didn't share, of course. Unfortunately for him, my voice was an equal now at the table, and I felt like I was about to get to use it fully for the first time.

Smiling, I leaned down to Marinette. "I have an idea. Roll with me if you like it."

"Okay," she said.

"Adrien." Father was summoning us back to the table.

We sat, and at her boss's direction, Marinette proceeded to run through the designs in question, going to great pains to prove that despite the color snafu, the line itself bore no significant overlap with our own. I watched Father take it in stonily, and once she'd finished her presentation, he turned on her boss.

"Francie, this is unacceptable. I will have our lawyers press yours unless you immediately agree-"

"Gabriel!" Francie said tartly. "It's a god-damned color. Our styles are nowhere close to your dated designs."

Father straightened in his chair. "Our designs are classic. They never age."

"That explains why you're losing market share. To us."

My head pivoted between the two like a tennis match. I started to feel a growing admiration for Marinette's boss; she was the first person in years to take it to Father. And she was right, I'd been making the same case for a while now that our styles were looking long in the tooth. I let the two of them duke it out for a few minutes before I cleared my throat. "If I may," I interrupted.

Father and Francie paused and turned toward me. Both appeared startled that I'd said anything.

"I say we co-brand it."

Father stared at me. "We _what?_"

"Co-brand. A joint effort between House of Gabriel and Chateau Le Blanc. In exchange for adding our logo to the mix, and a small percentage on the sales, we use our global distribution network to get these pieces out and augment it with a modest ad buy."

Now Francie was staring at me. "Why would you work with us?"

"Despite what your designer has said," I nodded to Marinette, "some of the cuts on those outfits are dangerously close to what we already have in the pipeline. This allows us to avoid some messy legal entanglements; instead we both win in terms of getting some fresh looks out in time for the Fall."

All three of them were looking at me.

"Essentially, Francine, you'll get to license House of Gabriel. None of your competitors will have that advantage."

I could see her turning it over in her head. I could also see Father, ever shrewd, starting to nod.

"What percentage are you thinking?"

"Eighteen percent," I said easily, having run the numbers in my head. "Sell more than fifteen thousand units and I'll drop it to fifteen." I paused. "Sell sixty thousand and we'll cut it to twelve."

Both Francine and Father were nodding now.

"How long?" Francine asked.

"We have exclusive rights to distribute this line and any others you create for the next two years. And," I added, looking over to Marinette, "we get to see your designs much further in advance to avoid this situation in the future."

Marinette turned to her boss. "That seems like a reasonable ask, if we go into a partnership with House of Gabriel."

Francine looked between her and me, studiously avoiding Father. "What do you think, Gabriel?"

"I think my son has managed to figure out a way both of our firms can profit," he said.

Francine nodded. "I'll have to take it back to the board."

"Take until tomorrow at five," I said. "After that, I'll have to unleash the lawyers for my Father."

Francine stood and shook my hand from across the table. "Gabriel, you should let Adrien out more. With him at the helm, you might have a chance to survive into the future."

"I'll take that under advisement," he said icily, and quickly fled the room.

"You're welcome," I said under my breath to his departing form. Turning back to Francine, I added: "Please do let me know as soon as you can. I'm not sure how long I can stall him."

"We will," she said, turning to Marinette. "I'll meet you in the lobby."

I stayed and helped Marinette disconnect from the projector. "That went better than I expected," she said.

"It did," I agreed. "I know how long you've been obsessing over this."

She snapped around to me. "You do?"

_Whoops!_

"House of Gabriel has spies everywhere," I quickly joked. "Heck," I added slyly, "you probably can't even trust an alley cat in this business."

Marinette looked at me for a long moment. "That might actually be the _only_ person I could trust," she said quietly.

It wasn't lost on me how she'd phrased the response, and I worried slightly I'd overplayed my hand. "Well, anyway," I said smoothly, "I've got another meeting to run to. It was great to see you again."

"Likewise," she smiled. "Don't be a stranger."

"I won't," I said, hand on the door. "You know your way out?"

"Yes."

I smiled the megawatt model smile and pushed out into the hallway, escaping to my office. The rest of the day was a mess of meetings, and by time I'd snuck to the rooftop stairwell to transform for my commute home, my mind was a soggy mess of oatmeal. Flying over the skyline refreshed my spirit immensely, and I landed on my balcony with a soft _thump_ and rolled to my bedroom door.

Marinette was in the kitchen and was just pulling something out of the oven. "Hey," she smiled as I leaned into kiss her. "How was your day?"

"Amazing," she said. "That meeting I've been worried about went better than I expected."

"That's great!" I enthused as I used a claw to uncork the bottle of wine she'd left for me.

"I ran into an old friend of mine, too. He turned out to be a genius."

"Should I be jealous?" I smiled slyly. "This isn't he guy you were pining away for back in high school?"

"Yeah," she said. "It was Adrien. And no, Chat, my heart is with you."

"Good," I replied, decanting the wine. "I'd hate to have to rough him up."


	7. Life of the Party

**Seven: Life of the Party**

_Author's Note: As I was enjoying some time off last week, I am shamelessly re-sharing what turned into a prequel for _Roommates_ that I wrote as part of the LadyNoirJuly 2019 series of prompts. I've adjusted it slightly so if you read the original, points for spotting the differences. As I mentioned when this was first published, it also serves as the backstory for ChubbyUnicornMama's excellent _Big Shot_. We still laugh at how that spawned Nathalie cleaning up after butterflies – but that is another story (literally) for another day. –ep_

* * *

"Holy catnip," I said. "Is this the CD that Nino created from his set at _the_ infamous party?"

Marinette poked her head out from her room, hands furiously working to put her hair into a professional ponytail and loosing. "The onenth on thesph counter?" she asked around the ribbon she had in her mouth. "Yesph."

She grimaced as her hands snagged on a knot in her hair. "Ow," she groaned. "I was pulling out some of my old designs from college, and it was in the same box as some of my notebooks."

I put the CD back on the kitchen counter where I'd found it and leapt over to her. "What did you do? This is a rat's nest today."

"One of my colleagues recommended a new shampoo, but it's resulted in this nasty frizz. I hate it."

"Here," I said, "come sit."

I drew her over to one of the barstools and began raking my claws through her hair, carefully detangling it. She wasn't naturally curly, so whatever she'd used had truly been horrible. "I've not seen it this bad in a while," I laughed. "Lucky for you, I am a catspert in fur care."

It only took a few minutes for me to get her back to some semblance of normalcy, and I finished up by carefully tying off her pink ribbon. "I miss the pigtails," I lamented, then quickly added, "but you are pawsitively gorgeous however you do your hair."

She turned up to me and smiled. "Well, they aren't quite the image I want at the office, kitty. But I'll happily bring them back for you this weekend."

"Purromise?"

She could see the smile in my masked eyes. "Absolutely," she said, giving me a farewell kiss and nabbing one of the croissants I'd put out for her. "See you tonight!"

And with that, she was out the door.

I smiled after her, relishing in my delight at her happiness with her career. Munching on my own croissant, my feline eyes fell upon the CD once more. My call for that day's photo shoot was in about an hour, and I realized I had at least that long in the chair while they got me ready. Snagging the CD and sliding it into my costume pocket, I polished off the last of my breakfast, cleaned the kitchen and then leapt out my bedroom balcony for work.

Transforming in an alleyway close to the Grand Hotel, I arrived in the ballroom where the shoot was taking place and moved through it to the dressing rooms beyond. My makeup artist was already there, and I handed her the CD as I settled in.

"I don't know if you like dance music," I said to her, "but do you mind popping this into the player? It's from a friend."

Her eyes bugged out. "You know DJ Nino?"

"Yeah," I smiled. "We go way back," I added. Given my own stature, it was funny she was starstruck. "I can get you an autograph if you want...?"

"Could you?" she said as she slid the CD in and hit play. "And one for my kids? We have all of his albums."

"I'll see what I can do," I smiled as the first strains burst into the room. I closed my eyes as she settled in to create the model everyone expected and let the music wash over me.

The vibrant throbbing of the electronic music took me right back to that night years ago now, when I was still at University. It was the night I realized my budding relationship with Marinette had eclipsed my desire to woo Ladybug – and that I was completely comfortable with that turn of events.

I remembered arriving at the party, unsure of whether I really wanted to be there. Two years into life as a University student, I'd managed to steer clear of most of the social engagements that entailed, but that particular evening, Nino had the gig as a DJ and had asked if I would be going. Wanting to support my best friend, I agreed to an appearance, only intending to stay long enough to satisfy my purromise.

I recalled it had been a long day, one of many where I'd balanced my full course load, continued to model for House of Gabriel and the nearly daily obligation to save Paris from Hawkmoth. I was bone weary, and as I passed the euphemistically named "bar," actually considered grabbing one of the red cups in an effort to unwind. But I also knew one or two of those concoctions would likely have me snoozing in a dark corner, curled up cat-like.

The dance floor was already hopping, full mostly of undergraduates I really didn't know very well. Some of my friends from our high school days were there, and as I scanned further, I finally found two I knew better than most. Working my way through the throng, I put on my best model smile as I approached Alya and Marinette.

"Hey, Prin-Marinette," I said, giving her the traditional French air kiss. I'd nearly blown it, though: it was early days of the Chat and Marinette romance, making it increasingly difficult for me to keep Adrien in the friend zone with Marinette when I saw her. "Alya. How's your fiancé doing?"

She laughed, and my eyes fell to the glittering diamond on her finger. Nino had proposed a few months ago, with some help from a certain black kitty; I smiled every time I saw the photo she'd had the presence of mind to snap of me (as Chat) when I'd appeared tableside at the café he'd taken her to, holding the ring he then giddily presented to her. I was already committed to be his best man. "Not bad," she said. "He's trying out a new set that he might roll together for an album."

That made my eyebrows go up. Nino had been a monster, releasing new mixes for the dance floor one right after the other. His was a star on the rise. "Can we get an early copy?" I asked, pitching my voice to be heard over the thrum of the baseline.

"Of course," she said. "You two are his better beta listeners." Her eyes darted to Marinette, then down to the half-full soda bottle Marinette was holding. Snatching it, she said quickly, "I'll get a refill!"

Alya darted into the crowd and both of us rolled our eyes. Our old friend had pulled her usual stunt, but by now we were both aware that she'd been trying to match us since Dupont. I found myself smiling, Chat-like, at Marinette. Little did Alya know that we had indeed paired off - just not the way she'd expected.

"Good party?" I asked, making conversation. "I just got here, had a nasty photo shoot this afternoon," I explained. I tactfully left out that Chat and Ladybug had been called to action over at the Louvre, too. It was partly why I was late arriving.

"I don't know," she replied, trying to talk over the music. "I've only been here a short while, too." She looked up at Nino. "And as much as I love Nino, parties just aren't my thing."

"Me, either," I concurred. My eyes fell on hers, and it took everything I had not to wink at her and suggest I spirit her away from the crowd. Adrien wouldn't do that. But being this close to my girlfriend, Chat was desperately clawing his way into my consciousness and demanding some action.

Swallowing, I turned toward the raised dais Nino was on, trying to focus on what he was playing. It proved to be difficult; for whatever reason, the atmosphere had gotten to me, and all I could think about was the petite woman standing next to me. A moment later, I realized I'd snaked my arm over her shoulders, and to my surprise, she'd actually snuggled into me. I snuck a look down at her, and mentally weighed the pros and cons of throwing everything to the wind and giving in to the temptation to kiss her, gently, and whisper into her ear who was really holding her. That was nearly as strong as my urge to pick at the ribbon she'd used to put her hair into a ponytail.

Alya managed to save me at the last minute, returning with Marinette's soda. I saw her eyes take in my casual removal of the arm, and knew I was flushing slightly like the inner teen I suddenly felt like. "Chloe's here," she said without preamble.

My head swiveled, looking for the blond head that I knew always meant trouble. "I thought she was in New York?"

"She's visiting her dad," Alya said. "It must not be going well, though," she added. "She's already three sheets to the wind, and that bottle of Dom Perignon she's swigging from now won't improve her prospects much." Alya frowned a bit and finished with: "In the twenty minutes she's been here, she's managed to insult just about everyone."

I groaned, and thought I'd heard Marinette do the same. Nearly every time Chloe got into a state, someone wound up akumatized; I made a snap decision it would be wiser for Chat to be present, if only in the shadows, just in case.

"Wow!" I said, looking at my phone. "Is it that late already? I really need to go."

"You just got here!" Alya cried, eyes darting to Marinette and landing on the phone in her friend's hand. "Don't tell me. You have to leave, too?"

"Maman just texted," she nodded. "They need help with a big order at the Bakery for tomorrow."

I made my farewells and quickly exited despite Alya's pleas to stay for one more set. Marinette parted ways with me at the door to the club and I ducked into the first quiet alley I could find to become Chat Noir. Clawing my way to the roof, I happened upon open skylight and curled through it to a catwalk just above Nino's dais, ignoring the irony. The lighting rig masked my movements, and I stealthily crept to the edge and timed a leap to the balcony rimming the event space for a burst of loud trumpets in the track Nino was playing.

To my surprise, Ladybug was already crouched below the velvet-rimmed railing. "Great minds?" she laughed. "I heard Chloe was back in town."

"You must have picked up on my deepest desire to see you this evening, Milady," I said with a smile. "But yes, Chloe is down there. Somewhere."

"I wonder-" she started, but didn't finish.

A loud crash issued from the "bar" and we both turned toward it. Chloe had upended it with one hand, and the bartender was standing there, soaked by whatever had been on the counter at the time. My feline hearing was able to cut through the noise and discern Chloe berating the bartender for not giving her another bottle of Dom Perignon, and my masked eyes widened as I watched her simply pull one from the ice bath and demand the attendant open it.

"Uh…" I said. "Maybe we should have an intervention?"

"Good idea," Ladybug agreed, but before we could hurdle the balcony, a second crash issued from the far side of the room, followed by the telltale requisite screaming.

I locked eyes with Ladybug. Our akuma had appeared.

Turning, we saw a fellow university student standing just off the dais. Clad head-to-toe in a form-fitting yellow and black outfit, he was wearing some sort of enhanced set of goggles; I watched in amazement as he turned it on a gaggle of frantically escaping partygoers. After a yellow-and-black flash of light, the group had disappeared; I suspected strongly they might now be on the music poster he was holding in one hand.

"Not good enough!" he cried, his voice carrying now that Nino had stopped the music. "I am just as good as this clown! And more than good enough for you!"

Inexorably, the akuma started to move toward Chloe, who simply glared at him. If I hadn't known her as well as I did, I'd have assumed the alcohol was giving her false confidence. "Whatever," she said, swigging from her new bottle. "This party is just ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. I don't even know why I came."

"Don't worry," the akuma said with a menacing smile. "MixMaster will make sure you blend in with the party."

I rolled my eyes. The names Hawkmoth came up with! I looked to my partner, but before I could say anything, a stray spotlight had fallen on her. My breath caught as she sparkled in the glow; for the first time in years, I saw her in that gauzy way I first did as a lovestruck teenager. Clearing my throat, I tried again. "I'll distract?"

"As always," she smiled. I could see she was using her Lucky Vision, and leapt over the railing to give her the time she needed.

"Mind if I join the party?" I asked as I dropped in front of Chloe. "Honestly, though, I'm not really a fan of party crashers."

"At last! Thank you, Chat Noir," Chloe huffed with a glare at MixMaster.

"I was referring to you," I said snarkily.

"What-?" she said, spluttering.

"Fine," MixMaster said, and started to train his goggles on me.

I bounded backwards and nabbed Chloe, rolling to a corner through the dispersing crowd of guests. Coming up and out of the crouch with my baton, I smiled at the akuma. "Sorry, had to change tracks for that last number."

"That's not even a good pun," Chloe said hotly.

"Everyone's a critic," I replied as I moved back toward MixMaster. "I don't know what she said to you-"

The beam shot out and I leapt left, far enough that he had to turn away from Chloe to pursue me. I smiled, for her sense of self-preservation had kicked in - she scrambled from the floor and into the restroom she was close too, locking the door behind her. I suspected the door wouldn't present much of a challenge to MixMaster, but it was cute, nonetheless.

I paused to lean on my baton, hand on cheek. "-but you really have to give it up for her effort. It must have been something-"

He took another shot at me, but I was fractionally faster, falling backwards and under the beam. Scampering around to another corner, he shot at me a number of times; a few of the bystanders, unfortunately, wound up caught in his crosshairs, but I was sure Ladybug would get them out again with the Miraculous Cure.

I stood again, leaning against a temporary light post by the dais, twirling my tail. Above and behind me, I heard Ladybug quietly call out for her Lucky Charm, and knew we were now on the clock. "Look," I said brightly. "Give up now and we'll call it an early night, 'kay? I don't know about you, but I have class tomorrow-"

MixMaster bounded atop a table, nearly growling, and shot his goggles at me in a rapid-fire pace; I leapt, vaulted and rolled, but one errant shot caught my baton. I groaned as I watched it evaporate into thin air. That was likely to complicate things.

"Chat!" I heard from Ladybug. "I need your tail!"

I scrambled a bit to stay ahead of a now clearly furious MixMaster, unbuckling my belt as I ran. Nearing Ladybug's perch, I hurled it up to her. "What's the plan?" I asked as I vaulted up to the lighting catwalk.

"How are you at swan diving?" she asked. "And get your Cataclysm ready," she added as she landed next to me on the catwalk.

"Cataclysm!" I cried. I long ago had stopped questioning her when it came to the Rube Goldberg nature of her plans. As the power flew into my fingertips, I felt her reposition my belt around me; she'd quickly re-fashioned it into a climbing harness, and once it was re-buckled to me, I felt her tug at it from where she'd hooked her yo-yo.

Looking up, I saw she'd threaded the yo-yo through her Lucky Charm – some sort of polka-dotted pulley slung through a lighting hook in the ceiling. I looked back at her and just simply understood what she was going to do. "Ready," I said, holding my ring hand carefully as I used the other to grip the catwalk railing.

"Go for the poster," she said. "Now!"

I leapt from the catwalk, and felt the yo-yo play out behind me. Down I went, and she pulled slightly to give me just the right arc. Arm outstretched, I rolled sideways to avoid a shot from his goggles and to stay online with the poster. My fingertips grazed it as I went by; my arc sent me upwards slightly, and I tensed, intrinsically knowing Ladybug would release the yo-yo from my belt at the best moment for me to roll.

Hearing the _ziiing_ of the retracting yo-yo, I curled and landed, rolling up into my pounce-crouch just in time to see her snag the purple butterfly. A moment later, her cleansing spell washed through the space with a million of her tiny helpers; my baton dropped into my hand just as I'd started to put my tail to rights.

I hopped quickly over to a bespectacled student, wearing the bewildered expression common to Hawkmoth's victims. He didn't remember why he was angry, but he was also still quite drunk; opting for caution, I used the baton to call for a taxi and sent him home. But in the end, it didn't matter. Chloe had pulled her usual stunt and screwed up someone else's life, albeit briefly.

We found Chloe passed out in the bathroom, a slight trickle of drool running down her face. I was seriously tempted to snag a photo with my baton, but this time Adrien poked his head into my consciousness and decried the very thought. She might not be a true friend, but she was, after all, still a friend.

As we loaded her into a second taxi destined for the Grand Hotel, my ring chirped the two-minute warning. I could see from Ladybug's earrings that she was also down to two spots. "And here I was hoping we'd be able to spend more time together this evening," I quipped to her.

"I thought you already had a girlfriend," she teased.

"I do," I said, extending my baton and leaning on it with a dreamy expression. "I'm sad to say, my days of flirting with you are over, Milady."

Ladybug, of all things, started to smirk. "I never thought I'd see the day," she said, chuckling.

"And what would that be?" I was now leaning an elbow on the top of my baton, chin in hand.

"You. Giving up on me," she said good naturedly as she readied her yo-yo.

I leaned toward her on my baton and managed to graze a chaste kiss on the portion of her cheek that wasn't covered by her mask. "How will you _ever_ survive?" I teased.

"Oh, I suspect I'll find a way…" she answered as she sailed off into the night.

As the final strains of the last track on the CD faded out, my makeup artist whisked away the apron and I refocused on the here-and-now. Ladybug and I had fallen into a comfortable relationship after that evening; nearly from that point forward, I'd spent every free moment I had with Marinette. Whether in her dorm room, her bakery rooftop patio or random quiet spots that Chat Noir wouldn't attract as much attention, we'd set ourselves on a path that had led to our current situation with the apartment.

Standing and moving toward the ballroom and the long day ahead, I paused to smile at my fortune. Having Marinette in my life was like living inside of pure joy. The chance discovery of the CD had simply reminded me just how lucky this kitty had been.

Reformatting my Marinette smile into the megawatt supermodel version, I stepped out into the fracas with a song in my heart.


	8. Cooling Off

**Eight: Cooling Off**

_Author's Note: Given how warm the temperatures have been in Paris this year, it seemed appropriate to see how our duo would react to a sweltering weekend. Chat, as usual, gets creative while also managing to get himself into hot water._

* * *

Late August was usually extremely warm in Paris, and this season was no exception. A side benefit to being Chat was that my costume normally kept my personal temperature regulated fairly well; for really cold situations, I could always call on Glacier Plagg for a heavier outfit. I'd never had to try the asbestos-sounding Fire Plagg, though my kwami assured me I'd be able to walk across an active volcano with no problem while transformed with it.

It was nearly hot enough in Paris for me to be willing to break it out.

Our apartment was more modern than most and had central air conditioning, but one unlucky weekend found our part of the city experiencing rolling blackouts. With so much demand on the aging Parisian utility infrastructure, it had been deemed prudent to protect the network. The downside was there had been no notice, nor any rhyme or reason for how the blackouts would occur.

For the first time, I was finding it inconvenient to be encased in black leather.

Late that Saturday, I had my baton out and spinning in the general direction of Marinette, who was sagging on the couch across from my position atop the coffee table. All of the sliding doors and windows were open to catch what little air movement existed to no avail – it was hopelessly stuffy inside our tidy space. Ignoring the cramps in my biceps, I'd been fanning my girlfriend like some sort of strange take on an ancient Egyptian royal court for the better part of the afternoon.

My blond mane was matted down with sweat, and I'd been blinking away same since starting. But I knew Marinette was even more uncomfortable than I was, so I'd kept at it. Just as I was starting to fantasize about submerging myself up to my feline ears in a cold bath – something I'd never dream of doing as a cat, mind you – the lights flickered to life and the HVAC unit began to hum once more.

I rolled off the coffee table and lethargically made my way to the sliders for the balcony, pulling them shut with my rubbery-feeling arms. Seeing Marinette was still blotto on the couch, I repeated the process in my room and then carefully closed the door to her bedroom. It was still early days and I didn't wish to intrude in her personal space unless invited.

Hopping the couch with the last of my strength, I splayed out, face down, on the relative coolness of the coffee table, pressing my forehead into the glass. As table wasn't quite big enough, my legs and arms hung over the sides, which today was a bit of a godsend. The bath was becoming more appealing, even with the relatively cool breeze finally wafting out of the air conditioning grates.

"I am thinking how meowvelous it would be to bury myself in a tub of ice cream," I muttered into the glass. "Better yet, one of those shaved ice things."

"That sounds divine," Marinette agreed, the back of her head still resting over the edge of the couch. "Of all the times for the power to go out."

"Do you mind cold soup for dinner tonight?" I asked, voice muffled by the glass. "I don't think I can contemplate working the stove this evening."

"That sounds good to me," she said. "You want—"

We both groaned at that moment, for the lights cut out again and the breeze from the air conditioning faded to nothing.

Slowly, I started to bang my head against the table. "You know what?" I said, turning sideways to look at her. "Grab your suit. We're hitting the pool."

Marinette didn't move, but I could hear the arched eyebrow in her voice. "Along with all of Paris," she said. "And what, exactly, are you going to wear?"

"Don't worry about me," I smiled, knowing Plagg was going to be _very _unhappy with me.

To Marinette's surprise, I carried her across the rooftops of Paris toward the Grand Hotel and its exclusive rooftop pool. As Chat, I was well acquainted with our fellow Team Miraculous member, Chloe Bourgeois. While not my most favorite person, Chloe had come a long way from those early days at Dupont; I was sure her time as Queen Bee had adjusted her world view a bit, though she was still far from perfect. In any event, she'd graciously extended Team Miraculous an open invitation to use the Hotel's facilities whenever we wished. Despite her currently being in New York, I knew no one would question my arrival, nor the fact I had a guest with me.

Surprisingly, we had the rooftop to ourselves. I gently let Marinette off in one of the cabanas ringing the pool, and took one next to her so I could re-transform in Aqua Mode. I met her at the edge of the pool a moment later, and smiled as she ogled the subtle changes to my costume. "Fins?" she said at length.

"Yep," I smiled. "And I can breathe underwater."

"Not fair," she laughed and then jumped in with a splash that managed to drench me from ears to boots. I dove in after her, relishing in my ability to truly enjoy being in the water. I wasn't an athlete like my old schoolmate Kim, but I was a reasonably good swimmer even without the special transformation. Fortunately or not, I rarely needed to call on Aqua Mode; trotting it out now felt like I was shaking off the rust, making me only feel marginally guilty for using it without an active akuma being about.

Realizing Marinette might be worried about how long I'd been under, I kicked upward and broke the surface next to her. "Still not a huge fan of water," I said, shaking it out of my mane dramatically, "but today, it's worth it."

She bopped me on the head much like Ladybug would. "Liar," she smiled. "I saw you dolphin kicking around down there. You're loving every minute."

My eyes narrowed with the smile I was wearing. "You can't prove it, Princess," I laughed.

"I think I could," she laughed harder. "But it's too hot to try."

I swam to the edge and pulled myself out smoothly. Several floats were stacked up by the edge, and I grabbed two and brought them back to Marinette. She slid onto one, and I took the other. "I'm not a huge fan of Chloe," Marinette murmured to me, "but it was nice of her to make this available."

"I don't know if Ladybug has ever taken her up on the offer," I replied. "I once used the VIP suite so I could study for finals."

She half-turned toward me. "Really? Why?"

I shrugged. "I needed to be away from everyone," I said, "and it was the least obvious place someone would look for me." _Either version of me_, I didn't add.

"What was the course?" she asked casually.

My feline ears perked up at the subtle attempt to get personal information out of me. "A tough one," I laughed.

She turned more toward me, eyes narrowing. "That's the best I'm gonna get?"

"Yep," I laughed and rolled off the float and into the water.

I dove down to the depths, flipped, and the kicked powerfully upward toward her float; possibly sensing what I was about, she frantically tried to paddle away from me, but I hit the edge just where I wanted and tumbled her back into the water.

She sunk quickly, and I dove below her, caught her, and kicked toward the surface. She was spluttering. "Not… fair…!" she cried, shaking her head and cascading water everywhere.

"I know," I laughed. "I don't get to channel my inner child often."

"Are you kidding?" she said incredulously. "You act like a thirteen-year-old whenever you have that costume on!"

The smile on my face faltered. "I… I do?" I asked.

"Yes," she said, still spluttering as she kicked away from me and returned to her float. "Grow up, Chat!"

_That_ was not the response I'd expected. Narrowing my masked eyes, I sunk below the surface of the water, careful to keep my feline ears just above the water line. Then, slowly, I started to paddle toward her.

As expected, she started to shriek and began paddling away from me. That was more like it.

I picked up my pace and, just as I reached her, slid below her float and rotated. As I swiftly kicked below her, I ran my claws along the bottom of the plastic, piercing it with clinical precision.

Air bubbles appeared with abandon, and the float folded inward beneath her weight. I came around again and popped up in time to see her kick off and make for the edge of the pool. Two strong dolphin kicks later and I was beside her. "More like a six-year-old, I think," I grinned.

I hefted her over the edge, and she sat, staring down at me and looking just a bit bedraggled. But there was a smile of childish delight that hadn't been there before, and I knew I'd been right – she'd needed to _not_ be an adult for a bit just as much as I had.

"Incorrigible," she said, kissing me between the ears. "And now we owe Chloe for a float."

"I'm good for it," I said cheerfully.

She leaned down and kissed me properly, then pulled back. "That you are."


	9. Not So, Nice

**Nine: Not So, Nice**

_Author's Note: For those of you following _The Three Chats_, this is what was _supposed_to happen the day Future Chat finds the Rabbit Miraculous on his kitchen countertop. -ep_

* * *

"I'll be a bit late tonight, Chat," Marinette told me as she shrugged on her briefcase.

I smiled and kissed her before using a claw to play slightly with the ribbon she'd used to tie up her ponytail. "How late? Late as in I do crock-pot beef stew? Or late-late, as in I make you a sandwich you'll grab from the fridge at midnight?"

She laughed at me, hand on the door. "Late-late."

"Damn," I said, kissing her one more time. "I'll put the roast back into the freezer."

Marinette rang a finger along my mask, then used it to tap my bell. "Save it for the weekend," she smiled. "At least we'll have that to look forward to," she added somewhat despondently.

"Purrincess, it's not your fault," I smiled warmly, as I drew her into a hug. "I expected you'd have situations like this. It happens all the time in our industry."

Her head popped up from my chest. "Our?"

I groaned inwardly. Since returning from the Riviera, I'd increasingly found myself accidentally dropping in tidbits from Adrien. What was worse was Marinette had started to notice, too. "I feel like I am living vicariously through you," I said smoothly.

"Ah," she said, still looking a bit distraught.

"There will be another time, I purromise," I added, planting a final kiss on her head. "I'll be here when you get home."

She leaned up and kissed me. "How did I ever score such an understanding gentleman like you?" she asked.

"You didn't," I quipped. "You adopted a cat instead."

A smile finally broke out on my girlfriend's face, and I trailed a claw along it's edge. "That's more like it," I purred. "Now go get 'em, Mari."

And with that, she was out the door and off to her life as a junior fashion designer.

I backflipped to the kitchen counter, more because I could than any other reason, and cleared away the dishes from breakfast, then took my coffee over to the main balcony of our apartment. We had an amazing view of the Eiffel Tower, and I slid the door open to stand in the morning sunshine for a bit. I was free that day, with no modeling engagements. Originally, we'd planned on a long weekend getaway to Nice, but Marinette was tied up on a big new clothing line and had to bail at the last minute. I could use the break, anyway; the last few weeks had been pretty hectic for my alter-ego.

Pulling myself up, I balanced sideways on the rail with my tail hanging off to one side, and closed my eyes. I was going to sit there and soak in every photon for the next few hours, giving myself over to my baser cat instincts.

Oddly, Hawkmoth had been pretty quiet. I'd not seen Ladybug in more than ten days, but I had texted her just to make sure she'd remember who I was (she'd told me I was impossible to forget). I'd also let her know that my weekend plans had changed and I'd now be in Paris, and she'd told me how sad she was I'd not be able to have the romantic getaway I'd been regaling her about.

I dozed off, thinking happy thoughts, only to be startled awake by some disturbance in the apartment. Landing in my pounce crouch, I took a brief second to apologize to the smashed coffee mug laying in pieces on the balcony before creeping back into the apartment

Nothing was amiss, but my baton was buzzing its way off the kitchen counter. I'd taken it off with the intent of lounging on the couch and had forgotten about it. I popped it open to see the very worried face of Ladybug. "Chat! Where are you?"

"Home," I said, nonplussed. "I was apparently taking a little catnap," I added before registering her furtive glances offscreen. "What's wrong?" I asked. "Where are you?"

"Chateau Le Blanc," she said, still glancing off screen. "An akuma has taken over the design studio—"

I was already vaulting out my bedroom slider, trying to tamp down my anxiety. That was _exactly_where Marinette was supposed to be today. "On my way now," I said, as I leapt off my balcony and into the air. "Be there in less than five."

"Belay that, kitty," she said. "We need Cap and Rena. And maybe Viperion."

I hit the roof of the building across from mine and crouched, phone still open. "It's that serious?" I said, my stomach knotting.

"Yeah," she said, turning back toward me. Her look softened slightly. "Marinette is safe," she said softly. "I got her and most of the staff she was working with off the floor before it completely took the place over."

"Milady—"

"Thank me later. Get our friends and your cute kitty butt over here, pronto."

I arched an eyebrow as I started to run for the roof edge. "Milady, I had no idea you'd noticed."

"How could I not?" she laughed. "Especially clad in tight leather as it is."

Soaring over the rooftops of Paris, I made good time getting to Master Fu's new apartment. He'd moved from the location where I'd first seen him as we entered University; apparently, he never stayed in one spot too long for fear of discovery. His new location had the added benefit of an alley-facing window with a tiny ledge, just wide enough for a certain feline super hero to alight upon and tap his claws on the glass.

Master Fu appeared immediately and pulled the window open. "Chat Noir," he bowed. "I won't ask why you've come," he said as he stepped aside for me to leap into his small living room area. His television was on in the corner, and I got my first look at the akuma. I tried not to swallow too hard when I saw the building was smoking from several floors and now sported a gaping hole about where the design studio was located.

"Ladybug sent me," I said. "We need Rena, Cap and Viperion."

He nodded. "We'll have to have a chat with Ladybug," he said as he moved to the gramophone. "I will deliver these for you, but it may well be time for her to share the identities of the rest of the team with you. Or," he said as he pressed the combo for the Miraculous Box into the face of the ornate wood, "perhaps it is beyond time for our young members to retain their Miraculous in between deployments."

"I'll take that up with her," I agreed as I turned and leapt back out through the window. As I worked my way toward Ladybug, I couldn't help but think that Master Fu was correct on at least one count: my knowing the identities of our other team members would be handy at this point. This wasn't the first time one of us had to split to get them. And I knew I could get around the city faster that the wizened yet spry Guardian.

Landing on the same rooftop from which I'd watched Marinette head in for her first day of work not too long ago, I surveyed the smoking ruins of the upper reaches of the high rise. It didn't seem to be a far stretch to assume our akuma was a designer done wrong, and for a fleeting moment, I was tempted to try and call Marinette to ensure she was safe.

I dialed Ladybug instead, who picked up. "I'm here, and our cavalry is being summoned now."

She nodded. "I'm on the fifteenth floor, just above the studio," she said.

"On my way." I snapped the baton shut and then used it to pole vault from the roof and into the air; somersaulting, I dove through what was left of a window close to where I judged Ladybug would be. Rolling into a crouch, I tried not to smile as I saw she was standing next to me.

I started to say something snarky when both of our phones buzzed. I popped mine open to see Viperion; I smiled slightly. Over the years, he'd become quite a friend and a valuable asset to our team. I was more or less certain I knew who was under the mask (heck, I was pretty sure about Carapace and Rena, too), but had long ago played along with Ladybug's insistence on adhering to the Superhero Golden Rule. "Hey Viper," I said, falling into my shorthand for him. "I cat wait for you to get here."

"I'm just a few minutes out," he said, and I could see the wind ruffling his oddly colored hair as he moved through the air. "What are we looking at?"

"I haven't seen it yet myself," I replied, "but whatever it is, it's taken over an entire floor of the building."

"Okay," he nodded and rang off.

I looked to Ladybug. "Rena says they are on the far side of the city but will be here as quickly as they can."

I frowned. "Viper is closer," I said. "We'll have to make do. What's the plan?"

She motioned me over to where she had been looking through a crack in the floor, giving a relatively unobstructed view of the mess below us. I crouched and then leaned through upside down.

The floor was covered in pattern dummies, and it took a moment for me to realize the headless torsos were actually _moving_across the space in all directions. I assumed they were what was left of the victims Ladybug hadn't evacuated. Toward the center of the space was a tall woman, dressed in fine silk of gorgeous colors; her hair was done up in a triple-top bun, ringed with braids of pearls. She had something longish in one hand, and I watched in horror as she upended a design station to uncover a cowering worker. One tap on the head with the long stick and the worker flashed into another pattern dummy.

I pulled back. "Oh, lovely," I said. "What is she holding?"

"It was a pencil at one point," Ladybug said. "I'm thinking this akuma was a designer."

"Makes sense," I nodded.

There was a rubbery thump behind us, and I turned to see Viperion crouched by the window I'd come through. A fraction of a moment later, Carapace and Rena tumbled through the same window, landing together in perfect synchrony. I tried to stifle a knowing grin; they couldn't be any more obvious about how much time they spent together – in or out of the mask.

I turned back to Ladybug. "Looks like we can start the meoweeting, Milady," I quipped.

She grimaced and let it pass as our three teammates moved to us. Quickly, Ladybug sketched in what she'd seen, then launched into the plan. "From what I've observed, the pattern dummies are acting as protective drones. Chat will try and distract the akuma toward the center of the space; Viperion and Rena, I need you to pull the drones _away _from the akuma. Once it's just Chat and me, Cap, I need you to pull Shell-ter around us so we can work uninterrupted."

I nodded. "Lucky charm?"

"After Shell-ter," she said. "I won't know what to ask for until I'm sure we've isolated the akuma."

"Got it," Cap said.

"Ready when you are, LB," Rena said.

"I'll save Second Chance until you need it," Viperion added.

"Good call." She turned to me. "Ready, kitty?"

"Always, Milady," I waggled my eyebrows at her.

"Keep it up and I'll tell Marinette you're hitting on me," she laughed.

There was a sharp cackle from Rena. "And I'll back her story," she added.

I rolled my eyes and dropped cleanly through the hole and into the center of the room below, landing in a crouch. Something grazed my shoulder and I tumbled left, narrowly avoiding several pattern dummies that had descended on my position. I sprang up again and landed atop an upended cutting table. "Do you know how much cashmere costs these days?" I tsk-tsked. "I hope you have insurance."

"Black leather? So last decade," the akuma said. "Not breathable either, can't wear it to the mall."

I smiled. "I'd have to disagree," I said as I deftly leapt sideways again, landing of to the side of Designer. I extended the baton slightly and interlaced my paws atop it, emcee style. "This little number is just as fashionable as Channel's most popular outfit."

"Doubtful," she said as she lunged at me with what I could now clearly see was a massive number two pencil.

"I get your point," I said, narrowly avoiding being impaled by the business end of the pencil by quickly rising up on the baton. I gripped it and swung around it twice, landing closer to the center of the space. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Rena had created a fleet of Chats and Ladybugs; the pattern dummies were dispersing toward the corners of the space, leaving us clear in the center.

Viperion caught my eye – he was circling the space and had doused a few of the smaller fires in the space with a hand-held extinguisher, while simultaneously using it to smack back pattern dummies that hadn't fallen for Rena's mirage.

We were ready.

I moved closer to Designer, and felt Ladybug by my side. I waited a breath and was rewarded with hearing Cap call out for Shell-ter; a moment later, we were surrounded by his shimmering green shield. My eyes were firmly planted on the pencil, and when I finally turned to Ladybug, I could see she'd deduced the same thing.

"Lucky Charm!" she sang out, and from the bright flash of red ladybugs, a massive polka-dotted easel with paper and pencil appeared. Expecting this, Ladybug stepped over and started to sketch.

While still keeping my focus on Designer, I was struck by the efficient strokes my partner was making on the pad. In a few moments, she'd drawn a reasonable facsimile of a bathrobe (of all things). Having as much fashion sense as I did, though, it had to have been the most hideous thing ever created.

And I was further impressed at how easily she had drawn something that looked so bad.

Designer fell for it, and moved quickly to the pad. "Disgusting! Abhorrent!" she cried, and raised the pencil's eraser to eliminate what she was perceiving to be a blotch on the fashion industry.

Ladybug yelled at me. "Now!"

"_Cataclysm_!" I cried as I leapt toward Designer and her raised pencil. The power hit my fingers a fraction before I dusted them across the pencil; it melted to ash, releasing the purple butterfly almost immediately.

I landed in a crouch and flipped around to watch my partner cleanse the butterfly; one Miraculous Ladybug later, we were standing in the middle of the reconstituted design floor, surrounded by worker bees and one confused looking supervisor type.

We were right – the young woman's design had been struck from the new clothing line in favor of items from a new junior designer. It wasn't much of a leap for me to realize who she was referring to, and I shot a sidelong glance at Ladybug. Her eyes had gone wide as well, and unusually, she took the woman aside to comfort her, much as I normally would.

I went to our teammates instead. "Pound it!" I said, holding out my paw to the others, who responded in kind. We didn't have much time to chat, though, as three of us had chirping Miraculous.

"Thanks as always," I said to all of them. "Master Fu will meet you to retrieve your Miraculous," I added as I watched the three of them head off into the late morning sunshine. While it was nice having the extended team to call upon when needed, I generally found myself nostalgic for the days when it had just been the two of us after such a session.

Ladybug's touch on my pensive shoulder had me turning toward her. "This is ugly," she said, more somberly than normal. "Interoffice politics are not a favorite of mine. I think I've sorted it, though."

"Of course you did," I smiled. "Where did you get those mad sketching skills?"

For a moment, Ladybug looked uncomfortable. As she thought about answering, her earrings and my ring both chirped. "That's my cue," she said. "Pound it!" she added, and I touched my paw to her hand before she, too, leapt out the window.

I smiled after her and leapt out as well; I really wanted to see how Marinette was doing, so I eschewed returning to the apartment in favor of a quiet alleyway where I could recharge Plagg before returning to the rooftop overlooking Marinette's office. Using the baton, I speed dialed my girlfriend.

"Hey," her cute image said. "I'm fine," she quickly added before I could say anything. "I'm heading back to get my gear; they've given us the rest of the day off."

"Good for me, bad for your employer," I said. "I'm just heading back to the apartment now."

"Liar," she smiled. "I'll wager you're on the rooftop overlooking my building."

"Guilty as charged," I replied. "Want a lift?"

She looked at me thoughtfully. "You realize," she started, "I don't have to be back until Monday now. So yes, I'll take a lift, so long as we end up in Nice for the weekend as planned."

"Your wish is my command," I laughed.


	10. Nice & Again

**Ten: Nice and Again**

_Author's Note: So Chat actually does get his long weekend with Marinette after all! Of course, getting there is half the fun, right? But how, exactly, does a human-sized black cat get from Paris to Nice? Naturally, Chat has given this more thought that you would have expected. -ep_

* * *

I wasn't overly upset when I got the phone call from Marinette.

Waiting atop the building opposite the headquarters of Chateau Le Blanc, I'd intended to spirit her away toward our off-again, on-again weekend getaway in Nice – an unusual aftereffect of the akuma attack the company had suffered just an hour earlier which had resulted in all of the employees getting the rest of the day off. Unsurprisingly, though, when Marinette had ducked back into the building to collect her things, she'd wound up going into full counselor mode; by the time her chagrined face appeared on my baton phone, I knew she would be another couple of hours helping her shaken workmates cope with the rather unique experience foisted on them courtesy of Hawkmoth.

"I'll be another hour at least," she said. "Can we still make the train?"

"Our tickets are for the 1620 departure," I said. "So yes, but we'll have to hustle. You want me to continue to wait?" I asked, knowing I could carry her back to the apartment faster than her usual route on the Metro.

"No," she said thoughtfully. "Head home so you can finish packing, and I'll be along as quickly as I can."

"I'm holding you to that, Purrincess," I smiled as I clicked off and leapt into the blue sky toward home.

Marinette's original cancellation of our long-planned getaway had been so last minute, I'd not had a chance to rebook the tickets, so we were, indeed, still booked on the 1620 bullet train that ran nonstop from Paris to Nice. Assuming she wasn't delayed a whole lot longer, I had enough time to re-pack everything I'd unpacked earlier. It wasn't much, to be sure – I was likely going to have to stay transformed a bit more than normal – but my intention was to allow Plagg to roam, since he deserved a break as much as any of us. To that end, I'd borrowed a number of items from my favorite makeup artist, as well as a few goodies the internet had been able to provide.

Actually, I hadn't told her I'd splurged for a First Class compartment, mostly because I'd planned on surprising her with it. Her first months had been pretty hectic, so I'd justified the luxury as a way to jumpstart Marinette's ability to unwind for the weekend. Obtaining the tickets had required a bit of legerdemain and use of Chat Noir's Black Card, which I thought myself rather clever in obtaining just after graduation from University. I hadn't quite figured out how I'd be boarding the train, however; while Chat may have been an elite credit card holder, he didn't have an official national photo ID to go with it. I'd have to hope they'd believe I was the real feline.

The other problem – being seen in public with Marinette – was partially taken care of with the First Class ticket. We were guaranteed our own waiting lounge and subsequent private boarding. That would only work, though, if I managed to avoid the paparazzi on our way into the train station. I had a plan for that, though, provided Marinette was reasonably on time.

I smiled at the final part of my weekend package. Unknown to Marinette, the Agreste Family had a rather large mansion we euphemistically referred to as "the cottage" along a secluded beach in an exclusive part of Nice; when not in use by us, House of Gabriel made it available to discriminating clients wanting to keep a low profile. As Father was essentially a recluse these days, it was rented quite regularly. I'd used Chat's Black Card to book the cottage for the weekend, hoping it would appear to be just one more high roller guest in the long history of the location.

Explaining it all to Marinette, though, was going to require some finesse. My rather evasive answers to her questions about where we were staying had been along the lines of getting "an amazing deal on an AirBNB" I found online. As I'd not been to the cottage myself in years, I was a little worried some trace of my civilian identity might be in the space. Getting Marinette out of Paris for the weekend seemed worth the risk.

As I landed on my balcony, though, it occurred to me that I needed to re-clear my long weekend with Ladybug. It had taken quite a bit for me to ask her for the time off initially, more due to the fact that I really didn't want to leave her alone in case Hawkmoth decided to pull something. She'd covered for me before when I was out of town on business, but knowing that didn't make it any easier for me. Leaving her unprotected went against every fiber in my feline body.

The baton was still in my hand from travelling, so I slid it up to call her. Surprisingly, Carapace chose to take that moment to call _me_. I smiled a bit seeing my turtle teammate, for I was becoming increasingly convinced I knew who wore those bubble goggles. "Cap," I smiled. "Did Ladybug call a meeting?" I asked, knowing he didn't ordinarily keep his Miraculous.

"Dude, I hear you're going out of town!" he said, the quasi-surfer lilt to his voice nearly confirming my suspicion. "Your main girl, LB, decided this would be a good weekend for Rena and me to be in charge. We're on duty the whole weekend!" he said proudly.

I was torn between how happy I was that _he_ was happy, and wondering how Ladybug knew I was still leaving town. "That's great, Cap," I smiled. "Yeah, I'm taking Marinette to Nice. But if you run into anything, call me immediately and I'll be on the first train back. Faster, if needed," I added, knowing I could likely call on the House of Gabriel private jet for a real emergency.

"Don't trouble your mind, Chat," he said. "We've got it covered. Now have a good time!" he said as he clicked off.

I stared at the tiny screen for a few seconds before speed dialing Ladybug. She picked up almost immediately. "Hey Chat," she smiled. "You caught me out and about. What's up?"

"I just talked to Carapace," I said.

"Ah," she smiled wider. "You know about my plan, then?"

"Yes," I said, "but how did you know I was still going out of town?"

"You are?" she said, genuinely puzzled. "I thought you had to cancel?"

"I did, but with the akuma today, Marinette managed to get the weekend off. So we're still going."

"That's great!" she replied. "I confess to a tiny white lie; I told Carapace and Rena you were still going out of town. I thought it might be good for them to have some time in the hot seat." She smiled wider. "This is even better that you are going. I'm so happy for you!"

"Thanks," I said, unsure of why her answer felt hollow to me. "But if you need me—"

"I won't," she said quickly. "But I know where to find you. Now, go relax."

"As you wish, Milady," I laughed as we both hung up.

I de-transformed so Plagg could get a break and top off on his cheese; I hummed to myself as I pulled my luggage out of the closet and re-packed what I was taking, then buzzed through the shower. As I came back out of the bathroom toweling my hair, I heard the apartment door close.

"Chat?"

"Out in a moment," I said, muffling my voice in the towel. I'd tried variations on pitching my voice to sound more like Chat when I was not transformed, but each time Plagg had doubled over in laughter. My eyes caught his and he floated toward me. "Ready?" I whispered.

"Am I ever," he smiled. It warmed my heart that he was looking forward to this as much as I was.

"Plagg – claws out!" I whispered, and the green wave of transformation quickly washed over me. Once my cat vision appeared, I pulled the door open and bowed to Marinette. "Purrincess," I said. "Are you ready?"

"Am I ever," she laughed.

My eyes snapped up toward hers. Had she heard me talking to Plagg? "Indeed," I smiled.

Normally, I'd simply carry her wherever we were going, but with our luggage, we'd agreed that Marinette would call for taxi and meet me at the train station. I gave her a quick kiss as I started back toward my balcony. "I'll see you in a few," I said.

"Last one to the station buys the most expensive cocktail on the menu," she said as I hurled myself off the railing.

"You'd better get your credit card ready then, Princess," I chuckled as I soared back into the afternoon sky. She had no idea what she was about to experience.

I worked my way to the train station, and then perched on the ornamental façade of the grand structure. I'd not intended to race her at all and had, in fact, paralleled the taxi all the way to the station; I watched as it pulled up to the curb and then slid further to the VIP section. I couldn't help the massive Chat grin as she opened the door and found herself swarmed by porters; two took our luggage while the third whisked her through the exclusive First Class side entrance.

That was my cue.

Backflipping, I trotted across the rooftop and located the skylight I'd found a few days earlier while scoping out my plan. It gave directly into the First Class waiting lounge, and I crouched beside it to confirm that Marinette had entered the space. Smiling when I saw her, I popped it open just enough to slip through and drop down to the tile below in a crouch.

She was alone in the space, and per the part of the plan she'd known about, quickly pulled out my hoodie and sweats from the oversized carryall she had. But her eyes were dancing slightly with bemusement as she handed them to me. "This is _not_ what we discussed," she said.

"It's not?" I replied innocently as I threaded my boots through the sweatpants and tried not to snag an ear on the hoodie.

"No," she said. "And you also owe me a cocktail."

I chose not to correct her assumption. "It was an honor to lose to you," I said, bowing.

Whatever response she had on her mind was interrupted when the conductor appeared at the entrance on the platform side of the room. "Monsieur… Noir? Mademoiselle Dupain-Cheng?" His eyes flicked up from the tablet he was reading and caught my masked face beneath the hoodie.

I smiled my megawatt million-dollar model smile. "We're trying to keep this on the down-low," I said confidentially.

He returned my smile, his eyes rising higher to confirm the ears. I groaned inwardly; the mask was sometimes hidden in the recesses of the hood, but the ears were always a problem. "Of course," he said, "this way, please."

Quickly, he whisked us across to the waiting First-Class car, and showed us into a rather spacious compartment replete with a comfortable looking couch, two easy chairs and a sizable window. I'd thought to keep some Euros in my costume and heavily tipped the conductor as he bowed out. Once the door was closed, Marinette turned on me.

"What in heaven's name did you do?" she asked.

I hopped onto the couch and folded myself into a cat-like stance. "Would you believe me if I told you I had a coupon? One free upgrade when travelling with a cat?"

"No."

Flipping the hoodie back to free my ears, I shook my mane out. "I may have splurged," I said. "It seemed prudent in that we'd be guaranteed some level of privacy. I'm still acutely aware of my need to protect you; I didn't want us to appear on social media if I could help it."

She looked a bit worried. "Where on earth did you get the money? This had to have set you back—"

"You are worth every penny," I said, reaching for her and drawing her into me on the couch. "Besides, I had that extra income from the cat burglary I did last week-ooof!" I cried as she punched me in the chest.

"Not funny," she frowned, but she was quickly grinning. As the train began to slide quietly out of the station, she snuggled into me there on the couch and stayed there for the entire trip to Nice.

We reversed the process once the train pulled into Nice late that evening; Marinette took the taxi to the address I provided her, and I trailed along as best as I could; unlike Paris, the buildings were a bit shorter and spaced further apart, making it more difficult to run across the rooftops like I was accustomed. In the end, I wound up hitching a ride on a delivery van that was headed in the same direction, leaping off when it was within shouting distance.

The darkness covered my actions nicely, so much so that Marinette didn't see me perched on top of the fence ringing the cottage as she came up the steps from where the taxi had dropped her. "Princess," I said warmly.

Marinette jumped back with a shriek, and dropped the luggage. In a flash, I was down to her side immediately. "Sorry!" I said, holding her tightly. "I forget sometimes you can't see as well as I can."

"Don't do that again," she said, breathing deeply.

"I won't," I agreed, picking up the luggage and pushing my way through the gate.

From this angle, the cottage looked smaller than it was, but I could still hear Marinette's intake of breath as she caught sight of what little was illuminated by the small accent lights. I punched in the code for the door and went in, holding it for her as she followed.

Marinette stopped two steps into the space. "You said this was a cottage…"

"I know, right?" I whistled. "I think they undersold it a bit."

A wide space opened in front of us, two steps down from the door, with floor-to-ceiling glass facing the beach. Even with the panes closed, the crash of the surf below us was still evident but in a subtly muted way. An open plan kitchen was off to the left, and a small staircase leading to the loft was on the right; couches and other comfy seating were sunk two more steps into the center of the space, surrounding a small coffee table. I knew the two master suites on the loft were each bigger than our entire apartment in Paris, and came with their own jacuzzi tub. I'd be lucky to get Marinette out of her bedroom at all.

I smiled. When the Agrestes did something, they did it reasonably well.

Groceries were stacked on the counter per my order, and I could see the wine I'd requested was already in the rack. Despite the late hour, I led Marinette over to the breakfast bar and made a show of looking for the wine glasses before uncorking a bottle with my claw.

Decanting into her glass, I gazed into her blue eyes. "Surprised?"

"Seriously," she replied as I moved to fill my glass.

"You've been working pretty hard," I said as I pushed the cork back into the bottle. Holding my glass up, I continued. "Here's to you unwinding and enjoying your success. So far."

"So far," she said, clinking her glass to mine and sipping before turning that dazzling smile on me.


	11. So Nice

**Eleven: So Nice**

_Author's Note: Now that Chat and Marinette are pleasantly ensconced in their weekend, let's check in and see how it's going._

* * *

The late morning rays of sunshine cascading through my window felt divine. Despite having slept in well beyond what I would have even fantasized, the warm embrace of the sun kept me there, arm snagged under the pillow and eyes closed. I might have even been purring, but that could have also been my kwami, who had taken up a spot on the pillow next to me. That had been his traditional spot for years, despite my having provided a small bed for him fairly soon after he came into my life. Plagg had stopped alighting on my pillow once we'd moved into the apartment, so feeling his tiny presence just as I used to seemed to validate that this weekend had been a good idea.

For everyone.

As best as I could as with my quasi-augmented human hearing, I'd been trying to keep an ear on Marinette stirring, but between the two of us, we'd managed to finish the bottle of wine the evening prior. I knew from experience that generally made her less agreeable to early wakeup calls. Still, my intent was to make her breakfast on our first official vacation day; sighing, I pushed back the sheet and slid to the side of the bed, stretching, cat-like, in the dazzling sun. Standing, I walked to the sliders on the balcony and slid them open, getting a gust of salty air in the process.

The beach below was off the beaten path and quiet, one of the reasons we'd built the cottage here in the first place. We had our own private boardwalk across the dunes to the sand, and two chairs with an umbrella were already in place and waiting for us. That presented a conundrum, for my plan had been to stay de-transformed as much as possible. My costume normally kept my temperature regulated, and I was starting to have some doubts about my plan for our beach time.

Still, I'd made a promise to Plagg, so I supposed a little discomfort was in order. Given what a trooper he'd been with the whole apartment arrangement, it was the least I could do.

Stepping back into the room, I went to the small table and chair where I'd laid out what I'd planned to wear. The internet was a fabulous place, after all, and given how popular I was as a hero, it hadn't taken long to find someone willing to craft me a version of Chat Noir's outfit. I slid the arm of the costume through my fingers, again pleasantly surprised at how close the cosplay designer I'd worked with had managed to get the fabric to the real deal. It wasn't as nice as the outfit Father had made for the Clara Nightingale video – one I still had in my closet, actually, but was rather too small these days – but would do nicely.

I debated about what to wear beneath it – not something I normally worried about, obviously – and decided on, shall we say, a minimalist approach. It turned out to be amazingly difficult to get into the outfit, but at length I managed to get the bell zipper up to the right spot before turning to the next phase.

Adrien's hair was, of course, very close to Chat's; in preparation for the weekend, I'd let it grow a bit long (much to the consternation of my photographers) and as I sat down in front of the mirror, I carefully went about the business of making it appear to be carelessly mussed up and wild. Next came the headband topped with two triangular cat ears; the band was the same color as my hair and virtually disappeared when I put it on, though I knew right away I'd regret not opting for the clip-on ears the cosplay designer had recommended. The pressure from the headband was constant and rather uncomfortable.

I stood and went to the bathroom, locating the special set of contact lenses I'd surreptitiously ordered as well. Popping them in one at a time, I looked up and was a bit startled to see how realistic the cat eyes looked; they were of the extended type, filling the entire eye and correctly making my sclera the right shade of green. Not having the pupils actually change in the light was a tad creepy, though.

Finally, I looked at the makeup kit I'd borrowed from my favorite makeup artist. Popping it open revealed several tubes of color; I plucked out the eyeblack and quickly coated each of my eyelids with it, trying to mimic what I looked like when transformed. Putting back the eyeblack, I grabbed the silicon glue I'd ordered from Westmore online and wandered back to the table, where the Chat mask was waiting. Carefully dabbing the adhesive on the interior of the mask, I quickly pressed it to my face and waited for the glue to set.

As I stood there, gloved hands pressed to my face, I heard a chuckle from just behind my ear. "Not bad, kid," Plagg said, "but you forgot the tail."

"It's on the table," I said. "I could use some help with it, actually."

I felt something being slid around my waist, and then the buckle as it tightened at the small of my back. "There," Plagg said. "I couldn't have done better myself."

Pulling my hands down, I turned and smiled at my kwami. "Ta-dah!" I said proudly.

"Wow," he said, genuinely. "I can't believe you're really doing this."

I leaned down toward him. "I told you – I wanted you to have a break, too. I meant it."

For a long moment, I thought Plagg was going to hug me. His big green eyes mirrored the smile that broke out instead. "Thanks," he said simply.

"Don't go far," I cautioned him. "I'm still worried that Ladybug might need us."

"I don't think she'll be calling us," Plagg said, smiling oddly. "But I won't."

And with that, he zipped away, humming (yes, actually humming) to himself.

Exiting the bedroom, I nearly killed myself going down the steps when my tail got tangled in my feet. I'd not accounted for the fact that it wouldn't move as I normally expected it to, and wound up flipping it over my shoulder to get it out of the way. Quickly, I settled into creating the brunch I'd planned for my girlfriend, and was just pulling the quiche out of the oven when she padded down the steps about an hour later.

"Chat…?" she yawned before halting in the middle of the room. "Did you—I mean, are you—"

"Not transformed?" I finished, turning and smiling at her. "I gave Plagg the weekend off. What do you think?"

She slid onto a barstool across from the small stove I was working at. "I can't believe it. At first glance, I'd have said it was your normal outfit. But your hair isn't quite right. And you _never_ have your tail like that."

"I agree with the hair, but I didn't want to wear a wig to the beach," I said, eliciting a flash of something on Marinette's face. "The tail's problematic, too. I'll have to come up with something for the next time."

Marinette smiled. "I love how you are already planning the _next_ time." She reached up and I leaned toward her; carefully, she touched the faux feline ears and smiled again. "Wow, they even feel close."

"Not really," I groaned. "This headband is going to squeeze my brain out of my human ears, and what's worse? I didn't feel you just now."

"Well, now you know how I feel when I've got one of those things on."

"Indeed," I said as I slid a slice of quiche toward her and then put out the fresh blueberry muffins. The carafe of fresh-squeezed orange juice was close at hand, but as hungry as both of us were at that point, we settled in and munched happily.

The sun was fully out when we made our way to the beach and settled in on the lounge chairs beneath the umbrella. Marinette had put on a tasteful one-piece with a wrap, all of which were of the same perfectly pink Marinette color palette. She'd added a massive hat with a brim, and huge movie-star sunglasses to complete the look.

For my part, I found myself squinting into the light; I'd not thought to bring shades as my normal feline vision typically adjusted automatically. And as I feared, the black coloring of the costume warmed quickly in the mid-day heat; within a few minutes, I was sweating profusely and thinking of how I'd alter it in the future should we come back to the beach again. But it didn't matter, truly, for Marinette was clearly relaxing just as I'd hoped she would.

I heard her breathing get regular, and then tried not to laugh when she began to softly snore. For my part, I was wide awake, having slept more in the past twenty-four hours than I would normally. It went way back to my early days as Chat; I'd taken to escaping from the mansion shortly after dinner, roaming the night skies of Paris until the early morning hours and reveling in the freedom to come and go as I pleased. I smiled more. I'd rarely gotten more than a few hours of sleep for the rest of my high school years; I'd kept an even worse schedule at University, but that was more due to the fact I was squeezing in every possible minute I could with Marinette by then.

I had to admit, sharing an apartment with her had cut down on my nightly prowling. I still tended to patrol with Ladybug two or three nights a week, and might take the odd night to just gaze at the Eiffel Tower, but in truth, I was a far more domesticated cat than ever before.

And I couldn't be happier.

Watching the ocean waves as they crashed along the beach, I found myself enraptured by the blue water and the sense of peace it brought with it. I was tracing the surf with my eyes when I felt Plagg appear beside me. "This is beautiful," he said softly as he floated beside me. "You've done good, kid."

I sighed. "Thanks." I half turned toward him. "You know, when I was younger, I made all of these plans to spirit Ladybug here. I had this insane idea it would prove to her how much I loved her."

Plagg looked at me strangely. "You never mentioned that," he said.

I turned back to the surf. "They were foolish dreams of a teenager," I said. "But I never forgot how special a spot it was; when Marinette came into my life, I knew I'd have to share it with her at some point, too."

"Mmmm?" I heard beside me. Plagg poofed away as Marinette turned toward me and cracked an eye. "Did you say something, Chat?"

"Yes," I said. "Did you want something? I've got water in the cooler, or if you want something stronger, one of my favorite sangrias."

Marinette smiled at me. "I think I have everything I need right now, kitty," she said, then paused for a moment before turning fully sideways and propping herself up on an elbow. "It does occur to me, however, _that_ costume comes off."

I closed my eyes and smiled my Chat smile. "Does it?" I said as I laced my paws behind my head. "I hadn't noticed."


	12. Rainy Days

**Twelve: Rainy Days**

_Author's Note: It's been sunny and warm for a bit in our little universe. Let's see what happens when we introduce a bit of dreary weather to the equation – and an item from Chat's past he never expected to see again. –ep_

* * *

In the two weeks since we returned from Nice, it had rained nearly every day. It had made both of our commutes to work miserable, though I felt it prudent _not_ to tell Marinette that de-transforming back to my civilian self erased the soggy mess instantly. My costume actually allowed the rain to bead up and roll off; it was generally my hair that suffered the worst aspects of being out and about, and I'd long found having my hair plastered to my scalp very unpleasant.

One especially dreary Thursday morning, I was slumped against the kitchen bar, slurping coffee and debating whether I could call out for the photoshoot I was supposed to be doing at the Grand Palais. Some American automaker had shipped several versions of pickup trucks for the new model year and had come up with the brilliant plan to have _the_ famous French supermodel standing next to each one. Not having driven anything other than on my Xbox, I had zero interest in cars and was not looking forward to the gig.

Marinette came out of her bedroom and saw my expression. "Ah," she said as she shrugged into her rain jacket while simultaneously trying to eat her croissant. "Is that today, then?" she asked, knowing only that I had an unsavory day at the office ahead of me.

"Yeah." I slurped again, something I rarely did.

She chuckled and leaned up for a kiss. "Just think of all the fun we had in Nice. It'll help you get through it."

I knew my face was flushing slightly at the first set of memories that popped into my head, and I smiled a bit sheepishly.

"Maybe not _those_ memories," she laughed as she made a dash for the doorway. "Anyway, I'm doing dinner this evening. Maman has a care package I'm picking up after work."

That brought a genuine smile to my face. "That already sounds delicious."

"Should be," she said. She moved to the side of the door and retrieved an umbrella from the stand. She'd used it a million times before, but that particular morning, the light caught the House of Gabriel logo perfectly.

I nearly choked on my coffee. Actually, I _did_ choke on my coffee, causing her to turn toward me, concern on her face. "Are you okay?"

Waving a paw at her, I coughed the worst of it out, vaguely wondering if a hairball might appear just for good measure. When I could breathe again, I asked: "Where did you get that umbrella?"

Marinette looked to the umbrella, and her eyes widened when she saw the logo. "This? I've had it for years. It was given to me by a… friend." She looked back. "Why do you ask?"

"No reason," I smiled, trying to cover my surprise. "Have a great day!"

Wearing a bemused expression, Marinette exited to the hallway.

I stood there at the counter, dumbfounded. For I was reasonably certain it was the umbrella I'd given her that day back at Dupont – my first day in class, my first day as Chat Noir. I'd no idea she'd kept it all these years, nor that it had retained some special significance for her.

One more sliding down the half-wall of the kitchen bar, I sat with my back against it and wondered. Was it significant that she was still holding onto something from Adrien? I'd be the first to admit to a high level of insecurity with respect to relationships; despite her clear joy at our current arrangement, and mine for that matter, I suddenly worried that she was secretly pining away for my alter ego.

The logical part of my feline brain pointed out how loopy this line of reasoning was – especially given the rather special weekend our trip to Nice had turned into. And yet, it had suddenly taken root, demanding that I do something. Knowing I had to scat to make my call for the photoshoot, I drained the last of my coffee and put it the whole crazy train on the back burner.

That lasted about a week, when, on yet another rainy morning, my feline eyes caught her taking the umbrella out of the stand once more. Before she had a chance to escape, I impulsively asked her if she had meetings all day.

"Just in the morning," she said. "I might actually get a lunch break today." Marinette looked at me with a glimmer of anticipation. "Why? Want to meet somewhere?"

"Absolutely!" I said. "I don't know what's on my calendar; let me check it?" I smiled a bit. "I'll warn you that I might _think_ I'm open only to find I'm gonna be late for dinner." I started for my bedroom and quickly logged into my laptop, scanning my daily schedule from both House of Gabriel and my agent. As I suspected, I had a photoshoot over lunch, but nothing at the office.

I trotted back out again. "Bad news," I said, trying my best to look forlorn.

Marinette rolled her eyes, for it wasn't the first time I'd not paid attention to the schedule my assistant dutifully emailed – and then printed out for me each day. "Figures," she sighed good naturedly. "See you tonight," she said as she kissed me again.

As the door closed on her departing form, I quickly called my agent and managed to get her to delay the noontime catalog shoot I was doing to mid-afternoon. After I hung up with her, I realized I'd made the call as Chat – it was no wonder she'd asked three times if something was wrong with me. Somewhat chagrined that my emotions were overriding my common sense, I prudently decided to text Marinette.

**_Adrien:_** _Hey stranger – I'm going to be close to you at noon. Free for lunch? Would love to catch up._

I waited a bit and then saw the response coming back.

**_Mari:_**_ Holy cow! I was just thinking about you. Absolutely! What time?_

**_Adrien: _**_1145? I'll be in the lobby of your building._

**_Mari:_**_ You won't be hard to miss, that's for sure! See you then._

I put my civilian phone down on the counter and seriously chastised myself for even going down this path. Like it or not, I'd set the wheels in motion, though, and now needed to see where it went. I wandered into my bedroom and over to the walk-in closet, and critically scanned the three outfits hanging there; since I was generally Chat, most of my wardrobe as Adrien was in storage or hanging in my private office space at House of Gabriel. But out of some weird sense of humor, I happened to have an adult version of the t-shirt and button-down I wore religiously while in high school; my mouth quirked into a smile as I dug out a pair of jeans and some tennis shoes to match.

Plagg roamed the apartment while I showered and donned the outfit. He reappeared as I ruffled my hair with my fingers, hovering over my shoulder and examining me in the bathroom's mirror. "This brings back memories," he said, before quickly zipping into my shirt. "Hey!" he said, his tiny voice muffled by the fabric, "there's an actual pocket in here now!"

"It was my first contribution to House of Gabriel," I laughed. "The lead designer thought I was crazy until I told him teens would put their cell phones there."

"Clever," he said as he re-appeared by my shoulder. "Though it appears to be just the right size for a kwami," he added, arching one of his eyebrows.

"Is it?" I said with a smirk. "Whoop! Time to go," I added after a quick glance at my civilian phone.

"Okay," he said, "but Adrien?"

I looked at him.

"Don't mess this up. It's not time for her to know who you are, yet," he said, "and you don't want to… unnecessarily complicate matters for Chat, either." He paused a bit. "You've come so far," he said proudly. "Both of you deserve each other, but if you aren't careful today…" he trailed off.

I saw Plagg's expression, and knew what he was getting at. I turned and leaned against the counter. "This is nuts, isn't it?" I asked rhetorically.

"Yes and no," Plagg answered anyway. "There is some merit to having Adrien remain in the periphery of Marinette's life," he observed. "Especially when the day _does _finally come that you can reveal yourself to her."

I smiled at my kwami. "You are a smart one, aren't you?"

"It would have saved us a lot of time if you'd realized that years ago," he smirked. "Okay, now I'm ready."

My eyes crinkled with good humor. I had no idea what I would do if Plagg ever left my life. "Plagg – claws out!" I cried, channeling teenage Adrien by going through the transformation moves I once thought were so cool; these days, I essentially did the bare minimum to wash the magic over me. But for a moment, I felt the same thrill I once did all those years ago in the mansion bedroom.

I could have sworn Plagg was seriously laughing at me as he phased into my ring; once the flash of transformation receded, I turned to grab my civilian phone from the counter and once more caught myself in the mirror as Chat. I'd seen myself hundreds of times now, but today, with childhood memories suddenly fresh, I found myself scanning for differences; the general costume was the same, for sure – I'd loved the initial pattern and hadn't tweaked much over the years. My mane was a bit lighter, and certainly I'd filled out with the muscles younger me had only dreamed about, but overall I just looked like a larger, older version of me.

I smiled at that thought, for deep down, I knew I was still that kid of thirteen that Plagg had found when I'd opened the box. I was also reasonably certain it was one of the aspects of Chat Marinette had fallen in love with. That made me smile wider, and as I made for the balcony and the rainy day beyond, made me realize that while my original idea for lunch had been flawed, the chance to spend an hour with her was wonderful. The umbrella may just have been a ringer after all.

Landing in an alleyway close to Marinette's office building, I shook the water out of my mane and belatedly realized I'd neglected to don an overcoat or bring my own umbrella. Peeking around the corner, I assumed I could make a mad dash to the lobby before I got completely drenched; pulling back, I dropped my transformation and then hurried across the street and wider plaza in front of the entrance, head ducked slightly under the relentless downpour.

Pushing through the revolving door, I halted in the wide multi-storied atrium. Voices echoed across the chamber, and as I took my bearings, I was pleasantly surprised to find a café hiding behind the bank of glass elevators in the center of the space. As it was still early for the lunch hour, I made my way across to small table for two beneath a potted tree decked out in happy party lights that reminded me of Marinette's old rooftop escape at the Bakery.

On the dot of 1145, Marinette exited one of the glass elevators and paused, scanning for me. I stood and called out: "Mari!"

She turned her head and her face lit up with her warm smile. "Adrien!" she said as she walked over.

I took her into a hug and gave her the traditional French kiss, though it took every ounce of willpower not to do my Chat bow-and-kiss-hand maneuver. "Mari, you look amazing!" I gushed as I pulled the chair out for her, and then returned to my own. As I waved to the waitress, I handed her the second menu. "I had no idea this little spot was here."

"It's pretty good," Marinette said carefully.

I nodded. Having seen the prices on the menu, I presumed as a junior designer she wasn't a frequent patron. I resolved to have Chat surprise her with a gift card when it wouldn't raise much suspicion. "Great," I said, "and by the way, this is on me. I can expense it back to House of Gabriel," I added conspiratorially as I leaned in and winked.

"All right," she laughed.

After we'd ordered, we fell into conversation like old friends do; as we talked, it dawned on me that I'd last seen her, as Adrien, during that color fiasco where I'd created a partnership between our two companies. I remarked on that as the soup course was cleared away, asking: "How has the line been going? From my side, it looks like it's been selling well."

"It has," Marinette replied. "It's funny you should bring that up. I think we have a meeting in a few weeks to talk about the spring line we're working on. You'll be there?"

"With a be—wouldn't miss it," I said, nearly dropping in a standard Chat line with her. That brought me up short; I was so comfortable with Marinette that I now realized I'd have to work harder to stay in Adrien mode.

Marinette caught the self edit, though, and got a wicked look on her face. "Still hanging with Chat, I see," she observed as she began work on her _bœuf à la Bourguignonne_.

I felt my face flush and then realized she'd just given me an opening. "Guilty as charged," I said. "He doesn't visit as much as he used to, but I still catch up with him from time to time."

"Oh?" she said, her fork paused halfway.

"Yeah." I spooned up some of my own dish. "He's pretty coy about it, but I get the sense he's finally settled down a bit," I said, my eyes twinkling devilishly.

"He has," she replied.

"You two look good together." I smiled even wider at her startled expression, and explained. "I still follow the Ladyblog. I don't know how Alya does it, but she's got some incredible shots of you out and about with Chat."

Marinette's face flamed slightly. "That girl and her camera will be the death of me," she muttered.

"Not as long as you have Chat by your side," I reminded her.

"True," she laughed.

We continued on companionably until she polished off her after-lunch coffee and grimaced at her phone. "I've got to get back," she said as she stood.

"I understand," I said as I came around to her side. "This was delightful. Let's do lunch a bit more regularly," I said.

"I'd like that," she smiled as I carefully kissed her farewell (in a very un-Chat manner).

I watched as my girlfriend made her way back toward the elevators and then rose up into the building, amazed once more that I'd managed to become part of her life. After settling with the waitress, who also asked for an autograph, I headed back out into the worsening storm and transformed in the alleyway once more. Back in full Chat mode, I rose up to the roof on my baton, and then paused to check my messages.

There was a text from Marinette waiting for me.

**_Purrincess:_**_ I know what you did today, Chat._

I raised a masked eyebrow, recognizing that she thought I had scoped out a time for my "friend" to have lunch with my girlfriend. I decided not to disabuse her of this notion.

**_Chat:_**_ I have no idea to what you are refurrring ;-)_

**_Purrincess:_**_ Regardless, thanks. It was fun seeing Adrien today._

**_Chat: _**_My pawleasure. Home on time?_

**_Purrincess:_**_ Yes. Do you mind something light for dinner? Lunch was great but I might have overindulged. :-( _

**_Chat: _**_Nope. I'll make scrambled eggs and toast._

**_Purrincess:_**_ Sounds divine, kitty. xx uu_

**_Chat:_**_ Till then xx uu_

Snapping the baton shut, I smiled to myself. I truly was the luckiest cat alive.


	13. Curious Kitty

**Thirteen: Curious Kitty**

_Author's Note: After pulling a near-all nighter fighting alongside Ladybug, Chat finds himself a bit sluggish the next morning. This triggers a concerned Marinette to want to know why he missed his morning coffee… _

* * *

I dropped out of the sky and landed perfunctorily in my four-point crouch onto my balcony, exhausted and mindful that my Miraculous was chirping madly at me. Ladybug and I had spent the evening chasing Hawkmoth's latest creation around the zoo, trying to corral it and the animals that kept getting loose as a result of our fight. Our battle against Alya's zookeeper father years earlier now seemed like a quaint walk in the park compared to the grueling exercise we'd just gone through, and as I dragged myself to my bed, I had half a mind to let the transformation just dissolve of its own accord.

Guilt is a powerful motivator, however; wanting to make sure Plagg was fed properly, I instead collapsed on my back, feline ears on my pillow. "Plagg, claws in," I said, voice still rough from both having to yell over the inferno as well as the dust and smoke we'd been dealing with.

My green wave of transformation washed over me, and an equally tired Plagg floated down to crumple on the pillow beside me. "I think I will cross the zoo off the list of places to visit in the foreseeable future," he muttered, closing his green eyes and wincing slightly.

I turned toward him slightly, concerned at both his actions and the tone of his voice. "Are you feeling okay?" I asked as I tried to see if he'd been physically harmed in any way. Not that is was technically possible – if anyone were to be injured, it would be me, of course, but I was well aware that we'd been forced to press harder than usual in this outing.

"Just exhausted," my kwami said with none of his usual churlishness.

I rolled off the bed and suppressed a groan at my still-sore muscles, thankful they would heal faster than normal due to the Miraculous. The small airtight cabinet holding the camembert was full, and I sorted through the options at hand to pluck a few of the, shall we say, rather aged specimens for Plagg to sample.

Crawling back up beside him, I was struck in that moment just how tiny and vulnerable the Kwami of Destruction looked curled up on my pillow. Despite how tired I felt, I leaned down and carefully propped him up with one hand, while laying out the stinky cheese in front of him with the other.

It took him a moment to polish off the first slice, which was something of a record for him; halfway through the second, though, I could see he was starting to feel revitalized, and I tried not to laugh as he plowed through the remaining selection with his normal gusto. At some point, I'd leaned up against the headboard to watch, and the last thing I saw before drifting off to sleep was a slightly rotund mini-god licking the crumbs off his paws with great satisfaction.

The next thing I heard was an urgent tapping, something I knew meant _danger _in capital letters, but my mushy feline brain was having trouble processing data. Only when the tapping didn't go away, and instead got louder and possibly more insistent despite pulling the pillow over my head, did alarms finally start to go off in my head.

My eyes snapped open a fraction of a second before my quasi-enhanced human hearing heard the doorknob starting to turn. Without thinking, I rolled off the bed and away from the door, grabbing a snoring Plagg as I went by. I landed in a four-point crouch on the far side of my bed, and tried to flatten myself further as I heard the door open, slightly.

That was followed by a quiet, but insistent: "Chat? Are you in here?"

"Purrincess?" I said, not even bothering to try and hide my normal voice. It still sounded – and felt – raw from all of the smoke. I was having more trouble keeping the spluttering Plagg quiet.

"Dear Lord!" Marinette breathed, then in a tumble of words, continued, concern in her voice. "Are you okay? It's nearly eight! You're never late for your coffee - don't you have to get to work? Someone's gonna be upset. When you didn't appear as I started up the Keurig, I thought something awful had happened to you."

Pulse now pounding due to the near reveal _and _the fact I was going to be late for my photoshoot, I coughed to try and buy some time. "Sorry to worry you," I replied. "LB and I had a tough one last night and I got in very, very late. I must have forgotten to set my alarm."

She paused, something clicking for her. "Oh my God," she said softly, and I heard her hurriedly back out of my suite and close the door a little. "You're not-"

"No," I said.

"I am _so _sorry… look, I didn't see anything – well, not a lot, actually – I mean, obviously I'd love to see you – what I mean is, I never intended to barge in like that–"

"It's okay, Mari," I said, silently laughing at both how cute she got when flustered and the fact I was crouched behind my bed, trying to hide from my girlfriend while wearing standard issue House of Gabriel boxer briefs. Honestly, she'd likely seen everything there was to see already in the months I'd hung around her in the Chat costume. "I could make this easier on both of us and just stand up—"

"No!" she said rather forcefully, then, "You can't yet? Right? Until Ladybug says it's okay?"

_On many levels, _I thought ruefully, which was quickly followed by _I need to get better pajamas._ "I suppose you're right," I laughed. "I'm fine, Mari, just tired. Thanks for being my backup alarm."

That made her laugh, too. "Don't get used to it!" she said. "See you tonight?"

"Yeah," I said, slowly banging my head against the bedframe.

I heard her start for the door and then turn back. "Chat?"

"Princess?"

"We're going to celebrate your birthday tonight. Be on time."

"Uh, okay," I said. "But it's not—"

"Bye!" she called out as the door shut behind her.

"—my birthday," I finished, pulling my head up over the edge of the bed. I turned to Plagg, who was floating next to me. "Birthday?" I shrugged.

"Don't look at me, kid," he yawned. "But she's not wrong."

"What are you talking about?" I said. "My birthday is weeks from now."

Plagg smirked. "I can't believe your girlfriend knows this better than you," he said.

"I—" I started, then paused. "Holy catnip," I said, sagging down again against the bed. "Is today the day?"

"Yep," Plagg said as he floated off to get yet another piece of cheese.

"Wow," I breathed and then found myself stifling a cough. As raw as my throat was from the prior evening, I could already tell my quick-healing abilities had taken the worst edge off it. By noontime my voice might even seem somewhat normal.

I sat there for a few more minutes, knowing I was quite late for a photoshoot, but also not really believing that it was, essentially, the birthday of Chat Noir – the day I accepted the Miraculous box and then appeared in public for the first time. I tried not to grimace at the memory of how raw I had been as a superhero that day; the pain of those missteps was offset by the fond memory of meeting Ladybug and falling in love.

It might not have worked out with Ladybug, but she was still an important part of my life.

Sighing, I managed to haul myself to the shower and got my morning back on track; fortunately, my favorite photographer was working the photoshoot I was seriously, egregiously late for and rolled with it in good humor.

I apologized profusely during the entire shoot, and managed to somehow compress the six hours I'd been asked to do into the four we'd had left. It may have also helped that I'd swung by the Dupain-Cheng Bakery on my way to the shoot in order to bribe everyone on the crew with Tom's macaroons. Still, landing back on my balcony after work, I remained bone-weary, muscles hung over from the prior night's fight and having to hold very specific positions for extended periods.

Staying in cat mode, I crept across my bedroom floor on all fours; reaching my door, I was pretty sure I could hear Marinette in the space beyond. That was odd, and caused me to arch a masked eyebrow as I pulled out my baton to confirm the time. It went higher when I realized she was home a full two hours early.

Gently, I tapped on my door with my claws. "Princess?" I called out. "Is it safe to come out?"

"Kitty!" I could hear that I'd startled Marinette, and she begin rustling something. The crinkling noise was music to my feline ears, and I ignored what followed. "Don't come out!"

I cracked the door open and slid my mane out into the space. "Whacha doing?" I said slyly, my eyes scanning the space and locating my girlfriend crouched over her design table in the corner of the room. Feeling a bit frisky, I stayed in full cat mode and kept to all fours as I skulked toward her, tail twisting in anticipation of discovery.

"Go away, Chat!" she cried as she furiously started to cover something on the worktop.

"And why are you home so early?" I asked as I carefully came up behind her and rubbed my head against the back of her leg. As a human-sized feline, that nearly knocked her over, but to her credit she held firm on the counter.

"I forget how curious you are," Marinette muttered as she slid a wooden pattern board over whatever she'd been fussing with; I placed my paws on the edge of the counter to pull myself up and saw the sewing machine had been plugging in and it's tiny work light was on.

"I got off early," she said, swiftly sliding the cover over the sewing machine, then turned her back against the table.

"What was that?" I asked, attempting to lean around her to see what she'd hidden. My feline sense of smell had already told me it was something made out of elastane or polyester, with a touch of cotton. Though she'd tried to hide it, a trailing thread in day-glow green was visible below the wood. I started to go for the thread with a claw tip when she swatted at me.

"Nothing," she said, carefully ignoring my shocked expression. "Now be a good kitty and go take a shower."

I pulled back, wondering if she could actually smell the styling products I'd been wearing at the shoot and knowing it was impossible that she would. "Princess? Are we going somewhere?"

"No," she said, "but clearly you've _been _somewhere rather… fragrant."

Two things occurred to me at that point. First, my sense of smell was better than hers, so I knew it was unlikely she could detect something on me that I couldn't. That led to item number two: she'd not expected me home quite so early and needed me out of the way to finish whatever she had planned.

Deciding to play along, I smiled and slid back down to the floor, but not before wrapping my tail around her ankle. "All right, Mari. I'll wash off… whatever I stepped in…" I said as I slowly pulled away from her and stalked back to my room on all fours.

"Take your time!" she called after me. "I'll let you know when you can come back out."

After carefully closing my door behind me, I zipped to the bathroom and turned on the shower, then skulked back to my door and pressed a feline ear to it. I was, after all, a cat, and secrets drove me wild.

My efforts were rewarded by hearing Marinette say, "Chat, get in the shower," followed by her cranking one of Nino's more obnoxious playlists on her iPad.

Chagrined that my girlfriend knew me as well as she did, I resigned myself to actually taking the third shower of the day (for I'd actually taken one after the shoot was over to remove the worst of what had been applied to me). I dropped my transformation and let Plagg wander off to have some cheese and generally relax; for my part, and despite myself, I luxuriated in the hot water as it cascaded over me and found myself unwinding. I'd not realized how tense I'd been, but it shouldn't have surprised me – after battling an akuma last night and then being the perfect model all day, I was a bit more frazzled than normal.

As I toweled off afterward, it dawned on me that perhaps one other person had realized that, too. I smiled again, once more amazed at how seriously wonderful my girlfriend was.

I tossed on some casual gym clothes and then dragged Plagg away from his issue of _Camembert Illustrated_. "I've been a good cat," I said to him quietly, "but I _really _want to know what she's doing out there."

My kwami rolled his eyes and popped in one final slice of cheese before allowing me to call for my transformation. As soon as the green glow had washed over me, my feline ear was pressed to the door, straining to the Chat Noir limit to hear any clues from the other side. While there was a lot of movement out there – and, now, some very interesting smells in the kitchen – it wasn't indicative of any one thing. Making it more difficult for me, perhaps, was Marinette having swapped to a track of background white noise on her iPad. It was cleverly masking almost everything she was doing.

A part of my brain hoped no akuma would think of that, for it was truly interfering with my feline hearing.

"Princess?" I called out. "Can I come out now?"

"Not quite yet," she called back. "I need another thirty minutes. Hang loose for a bit longer."

Grumbling under my breath good naturedly, I leapt onto my bed and curled up facing the door to await the summons from Marinette. It was going to be a long half-hour.


	14. Happy Chatversary

**Fourteen: Happy Chatversary**

_Author's Note: Marinette is determined to celebrate the "birthday" of Chat Noir – the day he appeared in Paris for the first time. As it happens, Chat would rather forgo with suspense part of things. Be careful what you wish for, Chat…_

* * *

I couldn't help the way my tail was tapping, more so when I realized that this was part of the game Marinette was playing with me. For she was _playing_ with me, well aware that I both hated being out of the loop and staying cooped up like a common house pet.

That last part wasn't necessarily fair, for my bedroom was sized nicely, and I _was_ free to come and go as I pleased (compared with my pre-Chat days at the mansion). Still, the notion I was stuck in such a small space rankled me to no end. I finally realized I was taking it a bit too seriously when I found myself pacing back and forth in front of the door on all fours like a caged tiger waiting for the evening meal; laughing slightly to deflate the silliness of what I was doing, I hopped up onto my bed.

I curled up facing the door, putting my head down on my paws – my most cat-like position – and then settled in to wait for my princess to call me. I was well aware that I was fully capable of going through that door to see what she was up to; the more important point was the fact that I was willing to respect her wishes, even if they frustrated the heck out of me. And frustrate they did.

My feline hearing still couldn't penetrate the white noise her iPad was making, short of a stray crinkle or rustle that drove my curious feline brain to distraction. And the smells coming from the kitchen were a strange cacophony, though I was pretty certain I had puzzled out what she had done. Still, I decided it would be best to act like she had put one over on me, even if I did know it was one of my all time favorite dishes.

At about the point when I _was_ seriously contemplating breaking down the door, I finally heard Marinette call out from the other room. "All right, kitty, come on out!"

In a movement that would have been a blur to a human, I was at the door and then through it; I landed in a crouch in the middle of our apartment and found she had turned out all of the lights. A candelabra I'd never seen before was on the kitchen bar, eight tapers lit with subtle flames dancing in the eddies of the room. I turned slightly, for Marinette wasn't where I thought she'd be; instead of in the kitchen, she was sitting on the couch, her back to me.

"Princess?" I asked as I moved toward her and then stopped in my tracks.

It took a moment to register that she was wearing feline ears atop the bun she'd created for her hair; I'd seen her do it once before when we'd gone to a cosplay movie night years earlier. The petite ears were as adorable now as they had been then, and I found myself smiling as I crept around the edge of the couch.

I smiled wider when I saw she was wearing the whole Lady Noir costume – her very feminine take on my Chat Noir outfit, complete with mask and a tail that she was twirling in one hand. "Happy Birthday, Chat," she said, and only then did I notice she'd masterfully applied lipstick and eyeshadow in colors that both complimented her and the costume.

"Marinette," I breathed, my jaw agape. "You look extraordinary."

"Thanks, kitty," she smiled wider. "I thought it was the best way to celebrate your birthday." She paused. "Or, I suppose more appropriately, your Chatversary."

"I am both honored and humbled," I said as I leapt up to sit on the couch beside her. "But an ordinary cake would have sufficed."

"There is nothing ordinary about you or our relationship," she laughed. "So this seemed appropriate."

I leaned in for a kiss. "Thank you," I said. "It means a lot, even if it's not _really_ my birthday."

Her blue eyes danced with merriment. "It will have to do until I know who's under that mask," she replied.

"Thank you," I said again.

"Now, before we eat, I have a present or two for you."

I tried not to clap my hands like a two-year-old. "I feel like a kitten," I admitted as she slipped off the couch and walked around to the kitchen. It was hard to keep my eyes off of the curves that were exposed by her form-fitting costume; once more I wondered what kind of effect I had on _her_ by staying transformed.

She returned in short order with two large square boxes and one small one. "Open this one first," she said, handing me one and then sitting cross-legged on the coffee table. "How can you sit like this?" she asked incredulously. "It's quite uncomfortable."

"Not for me," I laughed as I shredded the paper with my claws. "Maybe it's a cat thing."

"It has to be," she smiled, arching an eyebrow as I made quick work of the box.

Beneath the black-and-green wrapping paper (I'd started to notice a common thread) was a small garment box. Using a claw tip to slice the tape holding it closed, I slid the top off and found something wrapped in green and black tissue paper. "How did you find so much stuff in my colors?" I asked, amazed.

"They're not particularly unusual colors, Chat," she chided.

"Black, maybe," I said, arching my own masked eyebrow right back at her. "But this green—" I held up a strip of wrapping paper "—is nearly a trademark of mine."

"Right," she laughed.

Shredding the tissue paper in a few passes with my claw (and garnering a cry of outrage at the mess I was generating from my girlfriend), I carefully pulled out a black long-sleeve shirt made with the technical fabric you'd see in high-end fitness apparel; as I pulled it out, I saw it had a pattern that mimicked the honeycomb one in my costume that became visible in the light. "How did you do that?" I asked, awed, as I continued to watch the pattern shimmer as I moved the fabric. My eyes went wide when I realized she'd even added the piping in key locations on the shirt, just as they appeared on my costume – right down to the metallic accents.

"Three-dimensional printing," she said excitedly. "We've been experimenting with it in one of our new lines, and I couldn't think of a better pattern to try it out on. Do you like it?"

"It's purrfect," I said. "And absolutely amazing."

A small day-glow green cat paw logo sat just at the right hip of the shirt, along with a stylized "M" that I knew was part of Marinette's official signature on her work. Pulling it further out of the box and unfolding it completely, I discovered it had an attached hood of the same fabric, complete with two faux cat ears. My masked eyes flicked up to hers, along with an arched masked eyebrow. "Keep going," she smiled.

Setting aside the shirt, I dug further and found a mask in the bottom of the box, made from the same breathable fabric as the shirt. I held it up and saw it was the exact shape of my actual mask. "How…?" I asked.

"Over a few nights," she explained, "while you catnapped on my lap there on the couch. You never even felt the tape measure."

The arched masked eyebrow went higher. "Should I be worried about you doing anything else to me while I was sleeping?"

Her blue eyes danced with merriment. "Most definitely," she laughed, handing me a second box. "Part two."

Setting aside my shirt and mask, I shredded the paper on the second box twice as quickly as the first, and slit the tape holding the carboard together with two claws this time. Once more I tore through the green-and-black tissue paper, this time revealing workout pants of the same technical fabric as the shirt, though of a slightly heavier weight. Two zippered pockets on either side evoked those of my real costume, and she'd even added piping just about the shin to mimic the real thing.

I dug further into the box and found a pair of slippers that looked just like the lower part of my boots, but were made of the same slightly heavier fabric as the trousers; a slight rubber sole ran along the bottom. I looked back at Marinette. "Princess… this is extraordinary."

Her eyes sparkled in the candlelight. "I'm glad you like it," she said. "I wanted you to have something other than those tattered sweats I see you in on the weekends—"

"That's so Plagg can get a rest," I pointed out.

"I know," she continued. "But you also tend to stay close to your bedroom, since that old hoodie of yours doesn't cover much."

I nodded. "True," I said, running my hands over the fabric of the pants.

"I want you to be able to spend your non-Chat downtime out here with me," she smiled.

Leaning over, I kissed her gently, still slightly awed by the effort she'd gone to. "That is very thoughtful, Mari," I said. "It means the world to me."

"Here," she said, handing me one last box. It was smaller than the first two.

For some reason, I intrinsically knew this one was _very_ special, and took my time peeling back the wrapping paper. The box was flat, and opened to reveal a pair of gloves of the same fabric, though they seemed to be a thickness between the shirt and the pants; holding them up, I realized she had double-stitched them to make sure my ring wouldn't be visible beneath them. If I wore them while detransformed, she'd not be able to see what the Cat Miraculous looked like in chameleon mode.

I looked up at her again, awed even more. "You've thought of everything!" I gushed, leaning over to kiss her once more. "Thanks!" I added as I tried to leap over the edge of the couch with my gifts in hand.

"Hey!" Marinette cried out good naturedly, leaping from the table to grab my tail and prevent me from escaping. "Where do you think you're going, kitty?"

"I'm gonna try these out!" I said excitedly, one paw on the edge of the couch.

"Whoa, kitty," she said, slowly reeling me back.

Normally, I'm not a fan of people yanking on my tail (figuratively or literally), but tonight I made an exception, allowing myself to fall into an embrace with my girlfriend. I was at a slightly awkward angle, but she still managed to kiss me deeply before pulling back with a smile. "Dinner is ready," she explained, "so let's eat first, and then you can model your outfit for me."

My ears went straight up.

_Model?_

I laughed nervously, for that was an odd thing for her to say; had she seen more than I realized that morning – something that had tipped her off to my alter-ego? Despite myself, I felt the color rising on my cheeks below the mask.

"That's cute, Mari," I continued to laugh as I moved off the couch and followed her to the kitchen.

Marinette seemed to sense my sudden discomfort and I chided myself for not covering it better. "It's just a figure of speech, Chat," she smiled, then added with a trace of slyness, "not that you _couldn't_ be a model."

Now thoroughly flustered, I unconsciously started to run my hand along the back of my neck. "I'm flattered you think that highly of me."

"Hey," she said good naturedly, "I'm teasing. Now, let's have some dinner and get this celebration under way!"

I smiled, but was now thoroughly distracted by my inner turmoil. Was it possible that she knew who I was, under the mask? And if she did, was that a bad thing? Either way, I felt like I was going to be in hot water with Ladybug.

Happy Chatversary indeed.


	15. Pay No Attention to the Chat

**Fifteen: Pay No Attention to the Chat Behind the Curtain**

_Author's Note: My apologies for missing a week! I had an unfortunate dental emergency that wrought havoc to my writing schedule. So a bonus-sized chapter for you today to help make up for it.  
_

_Still churning over the possibility that Marinette has somehow divined his true identity, Chat decides he might have to resort to some black cat tricks to throw her off his scent. Not that he wouldn't mind having her discover who he is…_

* * *

I had the shirt and workout pants laid out on my bed, but I wasn't really looking at them. My masked feline eyes were staring through them, trying to decide if I accidentally revealed myself to my girlfriend. The work Marinette had put into my Chat Birthday gifts had been phenomenal, but I was hung up on the joke she had made when I'd been dashing to my room to try them on.

_It's just a figure of speech… not that you couldn't be a model._

Had I detected an undercurrent in what she had said? Or was I seeing something that wasn't there?

The bigger question I was finding myself wrestling with was: did I care if she found out?

My masked eyes flicked back to my laptop on the small desk in the corner. It was still up on the Ladyblog, and in an effort to remind myself of the continuing danger my relationship with her placed Marinette in, had located the latest batch of photos Alya had managed to snag of the two of us as we'd returned from Nice a few weeks earlier. Not having wanted to broadcast that I'd been out of town, I'd been a little annoyed with the post; Marinette had promised to talk with her best friend about it, but in the interim, we'd pretty much kept to the apartment and managed to keep off the blog.

I hopped onto the bed and folded myself into a cat stance, still staring at the shirt and pants. For the first time since moving in with the girl of my dreams, I found myself seriously questioning the arrangement I had imposed on us – on _me_. It had come out of respect for my partner and her desire that we protect those we loved, though I knew at the end of the day Ladybug would respect my wishes if I told her I was going to reveal everything to Marinette. And yet, I intrinsically knew it wasn't time for me to do so; I still felt like I had to prove I was capable of being both a superhero _and_ a loving soulmate – able to balance both sides of the ledger without harming Marinette in any way.

Sighing, I decided I needed to come up with some way to either divine how much Marinette knew, or an impressive sleight of hand that would appear to make it impossible for Adrien to be Chat Noir. The last time I'd done the latter, though, I'd thrown myself off a rooftop as Adrien. Being a little older and (somewhat) wiser, such an amazingly cavalier act didn't appeal to me any longer. But pressing Marinette, no matter how subtle, might raise her suspicions – and, possibly, make it look like I was as green as my logo with jealousy. Which would be ironic.

I sighed again. This was going to be tricky.

I de-transformed, still deep in thought, and idly watched Plagg head for his stash of cheese as I changed for bed. After turning out the lights, I spent the night staring at the ceiling of my bedroom while my kwami slept on the pillow beside me. He still had his own mini-bed on the far side of the room, but since our trip to Nice, Plagg had returned to his original pattern, and it was strangely comforting having him softly snore by my ear just as he always had.

The early rays of sunshine combined with the gentle chirping of my phone alarm rousted me the next morning, having dropped off somewhere along the line while trying to come up with a plan. Stretching, I slid out from between the sheets and went through my morning ablutions. My alter-ego had a long morning of meetings at House of Gabriel, and a photoshoot over lunch and into the afternoon. It was too bad I couldn't use any of that in my plot-

My hands froze as they gelled my hair. _Meetings… I have that meeting with Marinette today! As Adrien!_

Standing there seeing my shocked expression in the mirror, the first threads of a plan started to form. I'd completely forgotten she was coming back to discuss the designs her firm had planned for next season; this time around, it was just going to be the two of us as her boss had delegated the task. I knew Father was still a bit annoyed at the partial coup I'd instigated and had similarly assigned the oversight of Chateau Le Blanc to me personally. I wasn't entirely sure I remembered my schedule for the morning, but if I timed it right…

I saw the Chat smile break out in the mirror. "Maybe…" I purred to my image. "Just maybe…"

Plagg appeared at my shoulder. "Oh no," he said, seeing the look on my eyes. "I only see that face when you're coming up with a cockamamy plan that's gonna get us into trouble."

Looking at him in the mirror as I finished up my hair, I smiled wider. "I'm trying to get us _out_ of trouble," I laughed. "Or find out how much trouble we're in already."

My kwami frowned. "Right," he said. "I'm going to need a lot of cheese to get through today."

I finished up in the bathroom and transformed so I could get my first of many cups of coffee for the day and catch Marinette before she left for her office. I was just pulling the mug out of the Keurig when she came barreling out of her suite, hands furiously trying to put her hair into a ponytail.

"Morning," she said warmly as I leaned down to kiss her.

"Busy day?" I asked as I pressed her croissant into her hand, knowing some of the answer.

"Partially," she answered between mouthfuls as she dashed to her design desk to stuff some printouts into her briefcase. As Chat, I'd actually already seen what she was planning to show Adrien later. I suspected the meeting was going to go well for her. "I've got to go to House of Gabriel this morning, but I have some free design time this afternoon."

"Do you?" I asked innocently. Her firm allowed her wide swaths of time every few weeks to find her muse, and she often alternated between her spots at the Trocadero and the park close to her family's Bakery. I didn't count the roof only I could get her to. "Which of your favorite spots, then?"

That made her pause. "Why? Want to join me?"

"Absolutely," I said, my tail twisting in anticipation. "But I can't get free until lunch."

"That'll work," she smiled. "Maybe I'll sketch my favorite kitty. I'll be at the park, I think. Then I can pick up something from the Bakery for dinner."

"Purrfect," I smiled my wide Chat smile and kissed her as she headed out the door. I finished my coffee and then bolted for my bedroom, vaulting out the open slider so I could get to work on time myself.

As Adrien, I managed to get through the initial set of meetings and was behind my desk trying to look like I was absorbed in whatever was on my flat screen monitor when in fact I was anything but. Mentally I was counting down the minutes before Marinette arrived for her meeting with me, and was silently pleased that she had been scheduled in the last slot I had before lunch and the photoshoot. Had I been _trying_ to do that, I never would have been able to pull it off.

Twenty minutes after she was due, my assistant knocked at the door. "Adrien?" he said, "Marinette Dupain-Cheng is here."

"Send her in," I smiled as I stood.

He nodded and bowed out; a moment later, my Princess appeared.

"Adrien, a thousand apologies," Marinette said as she stepped in and dropped her briefcase into one of the four chairs around my mini-conference table. "I got hung up in a discussion at our office and lost track of time."

"Not a problem," I said, having actually counted on this happening. "As long as you don't mind meeting on the run."

"What?" she asked, nonplussed.

"I have a photoshoot at the top of the hour," I shrugged as I came around from my desk and picked up the bag she'd just placed at the table. "I'll toss in lunch if you'll join me."

"Of course," she said, taking her bag from me. "You're the last thing on my calendar for today. Where's the shoot?"

"The park next to your family's Bakery, actually," I laughed as I dialed my assistant. "Tomas, can you get the car for Marinette? She'll be joining me at the photo shoot."

"On it," he replied.

I smiled again as I looked up at Marinette. "I have one more thing to do here and then I'll join you in my trailer?" I paused for effect. "You'll get a front row look at what it means to be a model, I'm afraid, but we'll have time to discuss your designs."

"Cool, I think," she said, eyes wide. "See you there."

I waited for Tomas to retrieve her before I quickly exited my office and made a brisk walk to the emergency stairwell outside of our suite; as I dashed up the steps, I transformed on the run, bursting onto the roof as Chat Noir. Leaping to the edge of the roofline, I perched on the decorative concrete and popped open my baton; I'd placed a cat tracker in Marinette's bag just to make sure I could keep tabs of her progress, and noted that she was just exiting the garage.

Smiling, I extended the baton and helicoptered to the next roof, then quickly ran along the spine, keeping ahead of the sedan. I managed to make it to the park well in advance of Marinette, landing on a slanted tile roof that gave a wide view of the park. Crouched and slightly hidden by a chimney, I popped open the baton and dialed my assistant.

"Adrien Agreste's Office," I heard.

"Tomas, it's Adrien," I said, belatedly realizing I sounded anything but. "Look, I decided to take the Metro to the park, but I forgot the wardrobe patterns I was supposed to go over with Marinette. Can you have the intern run the swatches over for me?"

"Absolutely," Tomas said. "They'll be there shortly."

"Thanks – have him give it to Marinette when he arrives. Oh, it'll be faster if you send him in a car."

There was a pause. "If you think that best," Tomas said quizzically as I hung up.

Pressing myself to the chimney, I peeked around as I heard the sedan approaching the entrance to the park. Moving quickly, I vaulted off the roof and re-vaulted from the top of the fence, helicoptering until I landed on top of the makeup trailer, then flipped off to land beside the steps. By the time Marinette came wandering toward me, a slight smile on her face, she found me leaning against the edge of the trailer, twirling my tail in one paw and smiling slyly.

"I had no idea your muse would be at the park today," I said, narrowing my masked eyes at her.

"And so he is," Marinette said as she ran a hand along my costumed shoulder.

I inclined my head toward the trailer meaningfully.

"Not him, you jealous tom cat," Marinette teased as she stepped in and hugged me. "Technically, I am having my meeting with him."

I narrowed my masked eyes more. "In his _trailer_?"

Marinette blushed slightly; it was an endearing thing to see, and something that had not graced her face in a bit. "Ah…" she said, looking between me and the door. "I can see how you'd come to that conclusion… but Adrien is not that kind of guy."

"Uh huh," I said, arching a masked eyebrow and trying hard not to smile. Keeping up the jealous act when the person in question was me was pretty tough.

"Hey, green-eyed monster," Marinette said good naturedly, "knock it off before I bop that fur brain of yours."

I smiled warmly, for that was partly what I was hoping I'd hear. "No promises," I laughed as I kissed her hair. "Are you still sketching?"

"Once I'm done," she said. "Wait for me in my usual spot?"

"Absolutely," I said. "I'll stay close so I can keep an eye on you," I added as I leaned down to kiss her again.

"I had no idea you could be so protective," Marinette laughed.

I smiled, again having hoped she'd say that. "Here," I said, popping a small round device off of my baton into her hand. "You can use this to keep track of me, too."

"What's this?" she asked, quizzically, turning it around in her hand to see a small circular screen. My green cat paw logo glowed dead center.

"Chat Tracker," I said. "It's similar to what LB and I use to track each other; for a civilian such as yourself, I've turned this on—" I slid one of my small tracking devices from a costume pocket "—for the next several hours."

"So I can keep an eye on you, too," she said, smiling. "All right."

"Exactly. Fair is fair, after all." My feline ears picked up the approach of the second Gabriel sedan. _Time to go_, I thought.

"Now off with you," she said, giving me one final kiss.

"Yes, ma'am," I said, mock saluting while also seeing the intern come up toward the trailer.

Using the baton, I rose up and away, and then vaulted off toward the end of the park housing the carousel the kids in the area generally flocked to. Fortunately, the set for the photo shoot blocked the view of the magnificent historical structure… and the particular bench Marinette favored. I hit the ground on the run, pausing only long enough to attach the cat tracker to the underside of the bench before leaping back up and over the fence. I vaulted across the street and scampered into an alleyway that would allow me to baton myself up into the sky. Surreptitiously, I used the darkened areas of the buildings ringing the park to return to the rooftop I'd started on. Sliding back around the chimney, I saw my intern approach Marinette; through my feline hearing, I was able to hear her shocked joy of recognition.

"Nathaniel?" Marinette asked.

"Mari?" The young illustrator paused just in front of my girlfriend. "When Tomas told me to give these to Marinette, I didn't realize it would be you! How are you?"

"Great!" I heard Marinette say as she drew him into a big hug. "It's been too long! I had no idea you were working for Adrien."

"Yeah, I took some gap years in school, but I started with him this spring. I'm his personal gofer and in-house sketch artist. It's been something."

"Wow! Tell me all about it…"

Smiling, I quickly worked my way to the far side of the park with the Metro stop and did the tried and true superhero-transform-on-the-fly maneuver in the darkness of the station. I came up the steps on the opposite side of the platform, crossed the street, and then entered the park through the entrance that led directly to the set and my trailer beyond, phone in hand. I looked up when I heard their voices.

"Thanks, Nathanial," I said, smiling warmly at both of them as I approached. "I completely forgot to grab those when I left."

Something crossed Nathanial's face. "Tomas said—"

"Metro was slower than usual," I laughed. "Not to mention full of autograph seekers. Serves me right trying to save Father money."

He nodded. "Do you need anything else?" he asked.

"Actually," I said, looking to Mari. "I promised Mari lunch. Can you run to the Bakery and grab something for the three of us?"

"Three?" he said, smiling slightly.

"Why not," I said. "I could use a third set of eyes on these designs. Think of it as part of your continuing growth as my intern." I looked up to the trailer, for my makeup artist had thrown open the door and was giving me the gimlet eye. "Uh, I'd better go in."

"I'll help Nathanial with lunch," Marinette offered.

"Okay," I said as I went up the steps. "But charge it to House of Gabriel."

"Absolutely," she said, laughing.

We discussed the plans for the next season over amazing onion soup, and made a few critical decisions before I was called to the set. Wanting to keep Marinette close (as Chat would not be where he was supposed to be were she to leave), I asked her to come to the set so we could continue the discussion in between setups. Marinette agreed and wound up spending a few hours with me (as Adrien) as a consequence. It wasn't lost on me that she checked the Chat Tracker I'd given her a few times, smiling slightly when she saw the paw print.

While the set changed for the final shot of the afternoon, Marinette laughed. I turned toward her. "Something I said?" I asked, arching an eyebrow.

"No," she said. "I just know I have a very hot-under-the-collar boyfriend cooling his paws waiting for me." To her credit, Marinette pulled out the tracker and showed it to me. "He's been waiting patiently for me to finish over by the carousel."

My eyes widened. "Chat… is here?" I asked, trying to look a bit concerned. "Is he… jealous?"

"You have _no_ idea," she laughed louder.

"Well," I said solemnly, "if it protects my skin, I think we've made all the decisions we can make for now. I'm sorry I kept you – I had no idea you had plans."'

"Don't worry about it," she said as she stood and packed up her bag. "This was important, and it was nice to spend some time with an old friend."

"It was," I smiled. "Tell him I'm sorry for keeping you."

"He won't believe me, but I will," she smiled as she gave me a quick hug. "I'll email the details to you when I get back to the office."

"Sounds good."

I watched as she walked away, waiting until she turned the corner at the entrance before popping out of my chair and finding the director. "I've got to get back to the office," I said. "Hopefully you've got enough?"

"I think we do," she said, perplexed. "But we only need—"

"Great! See you next time," I added over my shoulder as I hurried to the far exit from the park. I didn't normally eschew removing the hideous makeup but was aware how little time I had to get into position. Given the later hour, using the Metro again for a transformation wouldn't work, so I picked up the pace and crossed the street to find a quiet alley before calling for Plagg.

Vaulting up and out of the alleyway, I hurled myself over the building and helicoptered around the oddly shaped space, still keeping to the far side of the park. Owing to how the photo set had been constructed, Marinette had needed to exit the park and then walk around the long way to re-enter by the carousel. Though she was walking deliberately toward the carousel and our particular park bench close to it, she was also a bit absorbed in her phone – enough so I was able to drop down inside the park and scamper across the deserted space toward the bench in question.

The brown bench was a favorite of ours, and had the added benefit of being well away from the photo shoot set, not visible from where we had been – but it _was_ in the full late afternoon sunshine. Purrfect for the final step.

I reached under the bench and snapped the tracker off, then slid it back into my costume pocket. Crawling onto the bench, I curled up in a corner, placing my masked face on top of my paws. Closing my eyes, I created the appearance of a typical kitty enjoying a little warmth. As comfortable as I was, it was a good thing that Marinette was approaching for it would have been very easy to have taken a quick catnap.

A moment later, I felt a gentle hand to my costumed shoulder. "Chat?"

I cracked open a masked eye. "Hey, Princess," I said sleepily. "Sorry, the sunshine was too much to withstand."

"No wonder you haven't moved in hours," Marinette laughed as she sat down next to me. "I hadn't intended to be so late, either," she offered. "Thanks for waiting."

"For you, anything," I said, purring slightly as I leaned my head into her side. "So, sketching?"

"It's too late now," she said sadly. "I've lost the light."

"Oh," I said, realizing that in my pursuit of having Adrien and Chat in the same place at the same time, I'd actually ruined Marinette's plans for the afternoon. "_Oh_," I said with more meaning. "I'm so sorry!"

"It's okay," she said, but I could tell it wasn't.

I knew I needed to fix it. "I have an idea," I said as I unfolded myself and held out a paw. "Come with me?"

"Sure," she said as she took my paw, arching an eyebrow in the process. "Where are we going?"

"Someplace special." I put a paw around her waist and used my baton to push us up and into the darkening late afternoon sky.


	16. Someplace Special

**Sixteen: Someplace Special**

_Author's Note: Trying to make up for the fact that he ruined Marinette's afternoon of sketching, Chat takes his one-and-only to a special spot. (I make no apologies – this chapter is 100% fluff.)_

* * *

"When you said 'someplace special,' I have to admit, this was not a spot I would have come up with in a million years," Marinette said.

"I know," I laughed. "That was kind of the idea."

She sighed happily. "You sure have a knack for the unexpected."

I laughed louder, which was sort of a problem; Marinette quickly shushed me, and when that didn't work, leaned over and pulled me into a kiss that quite literally took my breath away. Gasping when we finally parted, I kept the grin but cut the chuckling as I turned to survey where I'd brought us.

We were ensconced atop one of the many floating restaurants that plied the Seine each night, offering four or five star dining with a stunning view to match. You just couldn't beat slowly drifting past some of the best landmarks of the city, all lit and sparkling in the night, and pairing it with good food and better company.

This particular restaurant boat was captained by a friend of Philippe, my normal go-to chef for all things Italian. I'd happened an off-hand comment to Philippe while picking up Lasagna for a quasi-regular rooftop dining night with Ladybug that I was looking for someplace romantic to take my girlfriend; thinking I was referring _to_ Ladybug, he immediately dialed his friend, who insisted I take her up on a dinner for two at some point in the future (no advance reservation required).

After messing up the afternoon for her, I'd immediately thought of that offer and had zeroed in on the proper boat soon after leaving the park with Marinette; landing gently outside the kitchen door on the back of the boat, I'd tapped my claws on the door and was met by Chef Helene herself. "Chat!" she'd said. "What a pleasant surprise!"

A few moments later, we were quite literally on top of the boat, sitting at a small table for two in the tiny open area adjacent to the enclosed helm. Aside from the sailor navigating just behind us, and the waiter who checked in on us from time to time, we were completely alone with the city surrounding us.

We'd already had our appetizer and were awaiting the main course. Marinette had pulled out her sketchbook, and in between bites of the house-made sourdough rolls, she'd quickly drawn several scenes on successive pages as we'd gently moved past them on the river. I generally didn't peek at her work, but tonight I couldn't help myself and kept leaning further and further to her side of the two-top.

I knew I was getting a bit too close when I felt my feline ear brush up against her blouse. "Chat," she said firmly. "If you wouldn't mind…"

"Sorry, Purrincess," I purred as I slid back to my side of the table. Still, for some reason I felt like I wanted to be part of the action; my tail started to tap against the decking, enough that I realized I needed a distraction. Fortunately, the waiter reappeared at that moment, and I ordered a glass of red.

"Red?" he asked, nonplussed. "I would have assumed Monsieur would be more of a connoisseur of white."

"You would," I smiled, "but tonight, I'd prefer red."

"Are you _sure_, Monsieur Noir?"

"Yes," I said, my smile starting to strain a bit. "If you please."

"Of course," he said as he bowed and disappeared.

Marinette was quietly chuckling. "You? And white wine?" She started to laugh harder, snorting in the process. "That's funny!"

"Exactly," I agreed.

She set aside her sketchbook when our main course arrived, and we settled in on a fabulous ragout. Our conversation was easy, though I found I was having to be careful not to tread into areas that Adrien had gone during the day (or our earlier lunch at her office a few weeks back). I was cognizant that some of her topics were designed to elicit more personal information out of me – a dance we had played from the beginning.

As the dishes were cleared away and we settled in to await dessert, she pulled out the sketchbook again and started at it once more, though this time, it was deliberately earnest. Careful not to get into her light, I slid around once more and to my surprise saw she'd started sketching in a suit. The lines were tasteful, and I couldn't help but recognize that the way she was working the lapels of the jacket bore a certain resemblance to the piping on my costume.

Amazed as I always was when I watched her work, by the time she'd shaded in parts of the shirt, I'd already decided to buy at least two, no matter the cost. "That is stunning," I breathed.

She looked up as if noticing me for the first time. "Oh! Thanks," she said as she scribbled her initials on the bottom. "It's been rattling around in my head for a bit."

"I'll take two," I said, putting words to my thought.

"Chat!" she laughed. "These will be rather high end. I'm not sure you can afford them."

I started to say something and then realized that aside from having purchased the apartment and the extravagantly decadent weekend in Nice, she literally had no idea what I was actually worth. Both of those high-profile expenses I had explained away as one-time windfalls, but it occurred to me if I continued my profligate ways, it might lead to questions I wasn't _quite_ ready to answer.

I donned a sad expression. "I suppose that's true," I said. "I need to keep my catnip supplier happy."

Marinette smacked me in the bicep, which honestly had to hurt her more than me. "Ow!" I said nonetheless. "What was that for?"

"You avoid catnip," she reminded me. "I've seen what it does to you."

I nodded. There had been a few occasions where an akuma had used that very cat-like trait against me; just a few whiffs of even pet-store stuff made me a little fuzzy around the edges. "True," I laughed. "Maybe I _am_ the rich playboy you accused me of being," I said, leaning my blonde mane into her. "And if I were, it would be my prerogative to spend every last Euro I own on you."

Something passed across her face, and then it was gone, but not before she carefully ran her finger down my nose and then bopped it. "You wouldn't have to do that to prove your love to me," she said softly.

"I know," I said. "But it's nice that I can." I waited a beat. "_If_ I were rich."

"If you were rich," she echoed, that vague look on her face once more.

Thinking I was on the verge of erasing all of my efforts of the day, I quickly changed her perspective by popping out of my chair and scooping her up into my arms, kissing her in the process. Twirling around the space with her in my embrace, my tail flapping behind me, I purred happily to her as she pressed her head into my chest. "I love you, Princess," I said very softly. "More and more each day, as impossible as that seems."

"It's not impossible, kitty," she said as she reached a hand to my bell and pulled me lower for another kiss. "For I feel the _exact_ same way."


	17. Under the Weather

**Seventeen: Under the Weather**

_Author's Note: Chat discovers standing for hours beneath a cold rain can have adverse effects._

_Special Note: As I am taking the plunge and doing the 2019 version of National November Write a Novel Month, I've created shorter chapters for the next few weeks so I can continue to provide fresh content while I am furiously working on that project. (Feel free to follow along if you like over on their website; I'll take all the support I can get!)_

* * *

The first indication that standing under a rain machine, in mid-autumn weather, was not a terribly good idea was the scratchy throat that developed soon afterward. I'd been booked to do another ad for the horrific cologne I'd been the face of for more than a decade, and the director had decided it to throw out the original concept my office had come up with in favor of a more dramatic water-drenched affair. Not only were the clothes I'd worn ruined beyond recognition, I'd come away feeling like I'd never, ever get warm again.

Which for a cat was a real worry.

I'd shucked out of the wet clothes in my trailer and into some comfy sweats, but still felt chilled to the core despite two additional cups of coffee. Deciding to blow off the rest of my official afternoon, I'd cancelled my appointments and transformed into Chat Noir with the express intent of finding a sunny rooftop that I could stretch out and luxuriate in fully. The second indication came when I cracked open the door to my trailer to ensure the coast was clear and immediately sneezed three times in rapid succession, drawing the attention of the lighting specialist who was packing up the set.

I managed to get the door closed before he caught the feline ears and mask, and leaned up against it for a moment trying to blink the tears from my eyes. "That was close," I muttered before skulking over to the window and lifting the blinds with a claw. Confirming for sure the coast was now clear, I opted to escape via the skylight this time, though I pressed myself close to the rooftop just in case someone had decided to look upward in that moment.

Generally they didn't; it had often worked in my favor that people tended to look side-to-side and down rather than up.

I crept to the edge of the roof away from the street we'd been shooting on and started to slip over the side when my feline frame was wracked with another set of sneezes; they came on so unexpectedly, I tumbled off the roof entirely and landed in a heap of black-cladded limbs beside the power cable for my trailer. Pushing myself up, I wondered if there were pigeons nearby or, worse, Monsieur Ramier. As I wiped my nose with a paw, I squinted and didn't see either close at hand. Also fortunately, no one had seen my tumble into the narrow alleyway behind my trailer.

Ego bruised, I skulked around the corner and clawed my way up the side of the building, stopping to sneeze a few more times halfway to the top. I was also _cold_, which was exceedingly unusual given my costume generally kept me at just the right temperature at all times. It concerned me enough that I picked up my pace and vaulted the final meters to the roof. Using the baton, I helicoptered into the blue sky and landed on the next roof, smoothly transitioning to a jog along the apex. A particularly wonderful sunny spot was in mind, and it only took me a few more minutes to land on dark-colored slanted tile roof that had an exceptional southern exposure.

I stretched out fully in the sun, feeling my costume soak up the rays but still, even fifteen minutes in, remained chilled to the bone. Enough so that I realized I was actually shivering despite being in broad daylight. I gave it another half hour before my teeth were chattering so fiercely, I feared dental damage.

Suddenly – and despite being a cat – a long, warm bath suddenly seemed like a divine idea.

Pulling my feline body away from the tile, I leapt back into the sky and efficiently worked my way back to our apartment. Since it was still early afternoon, Marinette hadn't yet returned; as I rolled through my balcony door, I continued right into the bathroom and the blessing of the jacuzzi tub that had come with the space.


	18. Warming Up

**Eighteen: Warming Up**

_Author's Note: Marinette discovers she has a sick (and now soggy) kitty to deal with, which she does with her standard aplomb._

_Special Note: As I am taking the plunge and doing the 2019 version of National November Write a Novel Month, I've created shorter chapters for the next few weeks so I can continue to provide fresh content while I am furiously working on that project. (Feel free to follow along if you like over on their website; I'll take all the support I can get!)_

* * *

I had no idea I'd lost track of time until I heard a loud knock on my bedroom door, followed by the concerned voice of my girlfriend. "Chat? Are you in there?"

"Yes," I called back.

"Did you skip dinner?" she asked.

"No," I said. "I'll be out in a minute."

There was a long pause. "Chat," she replied, "it's nearly 1900."

"What?!" I spluttered, quite literally; water splashed as I started to push myself out of the warm embrace of the tub.

"Can I come in?" she asked, concern more evident.

"Uh, sure…" I said, looking down and realizing I'd actually never dropped my transformation.

_Plagg… wow, I'm sorry…_

Marinette carefully opened the door and peeked around, her eyes landing on mine. "Hey," I said, slightly embarrassed. "You look like you've never seen a kitty in the bathtub before."

"I've not," she said as she crossed into the bathroom and tried to ignore the water I'd splashed out as she kneeled down next to me. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," I said.

"Right. You generally take a bath transformed, then?"

"No," I replied, hoping the flush on my cheeks wasn't that evident.

Marinette leaned down and, after brushing away a damp bang, kissed me gently on the forehead. Pulling back, she narrowed her eyes at me. "You're warm."

"Couldn't tell by me," I laughed. "I've been cold since-well, I left the office early."

"Huh," she nodded. "So you jumped into the jacuzzi instead."

I grinned sheepishly. "I tried a sunbeam on a rooftop first."

"I see," she said. "All right, let's get you out of here."

"Princess?"

"Come on," she said as she leaned over and grabbed a towel. "Let's get you to bed."

"Bed?" I repeated dumbly as I stood and took the towel she handed me – not that it was strictly necessary. The water rolled right off my costume.

"Yes," she said as she pushed up and lent me a hand to step out of the tub. "So typical. Why are men so bad at being sick?"

"I'm not sick," I said defensively.

"And there you go proving my point." She took me by the arm and propelled me to my bed; before I knew what was happening, she'd tucked me in so securely, about the only thing I could move were my feline ears.

"Uh…" I started. "About dinner…"

"Back in a moment."

My masked eyes followed her out, and I heard her rustling around the kitchen. Oddly, I was feeling quite comfortable swaddled in my comforter and without consciously agreeing to it, nodded off.

I'm not certain how long I catnapped, but was pleasantly awoken by the delectable smell of chocolate croissants. "Whatever that is, I want it," I murmured.

"I'm not surprised," Marinette laughed.

I cracked open a masked eye and saw Marinette leaning on an elbow next to me, holding out a small plate of my favorite treat (next to her passionfruit macaroons). "I'm not still dreaming, am I?"

"Why do you ask?" she replied.

"You're in my bed. With baked goods." I smiled slyly. "This _has_ to be a dream."


	19. Difficult Patient

**Nineteen: Difficult Patient**

_Author's Note: What do you do with a kitty who's under the weather? Marinette discovers her boyfriend is good at many things but being sick isn't one of them._

_Special Note: As I am taking the plunge and doing the 2019 version of National November Write a Novel Month, I've created shorter chapters for the next few weeks so I can continue to provide fresh content while I am furiously working on that project. (Feel free to follow along if you like over on their website; I'll take all the support I can get!)_

* * *

"Nice try, kitty," Marinette said with a smile as she pushed herself up. "But no, you're not dreaming. Although you _do_ have a pretty bad cold." She frowned as she leaned over and put a hand to my forehead, brushing away a bang in the process. "This came on fast."

I nodded. "I was okay this morning, but after—I mean, by lunch time, I was so cold that stepping into a wood-fired pizza oven wouldn't have been enough to warm me up."

Marinette sat back. "What were you doing, exactly?"

"My job," I smiled weakly. "If I tell you more…"

"Ah," she said. "Got it." Sliding off the bed, she added: "Do you have any cold medicine?"

"No," I said. "It's been years since I've gotten sick; in fact, I'm not sure I've been down for the count more than a handful of times since becoming Chat."

She tapped a finger against her lips thoughtfully. "I wonder if you need to transform before you take anything."

"Excellent question," I replied as I struggled under the comforter to turn toward her. "Heh… this is kind of tight," I laughed nervously. "I… uh… can't really move much."

"Good," Marinette replied with a devilish smile. "For if you can't take anything, we'll need to rely on your quick healing ability. And that means getting some rest."

I blinked, for I couldn't recall ever telling her about that particular attribute. "I don't necessarily have to stay transformed for that," I said cautiously, "but it would go faster if I did."

"Yeah," she nodded. "All right, get some sleep."

"Hang on," I said rather urgently, still struggling a bit and wondering if somehow Marinette had swaddled me with iron chains. "I'd not mind a tiny bite to eat first…"

"Of course," she said before pulling the plate away from me. "I'll go mix up a smoothie for you."

"A smoothie!" I mewled as I watched the luscious croissants move away from me.

"I'll bet you didn't have lunch, did you?"

Not wanting to admit she was right, I just stared at her accusingly.

"That's what I thought. I can get more protein into you with a smoothie. Back in a jiffy."

I had dark thoughts about Cataclysming in my way out of that comforter, but didn't want to have to buy another one. After wriggling around a bit to no avail, I thumped my head back onto the pillow in defeat and closed my eyes, not intending to nod off again but promptly doing so. A gentle nudge to the shoulder awoke me to the concerned blue eyes of my girlfriend.

"Hey," she said softly. "You zonked out again."

"How long?" I croaked, my throat suddenly as dry as the Sahara desert.

"It's almost midnight, so about three hours."

I groaned. "I'm sorry," I rasped. "This thing is apparently kicking my kitty butt."

"Indeed." Gently, Marinette put a hand behind my mane and sat me up; the comforter fell away easily, making me wonder why I'd had such trouble with it. "Take a sip," she said as she pressed a straw to my lips.

Even with a cold, the strawberry-kiwi protein shake she'd made exploded across my feline taste buds, and as hungry as I was, I gulped most of it down in short order. Clearly expecting this, she swapped the empty cup for a second one. "Slower this time, please," she cautioned.

I nodded, and closed my eyes in bliss as the pineapple-guava shake worked its way into my system. I wasn't sure how she'd managed to come up with fresh fruit in the middle of the night and thanked my kwami she had. Sadly, I slurped the last of the second glass up and looked to her. "That was insane," I said.

"I'm glad you liked them," she smiled. "Now, more sleep. I'll check on you in the morning."

"On one condition," I said suddenly.

"And that would be?"

"Stay?" I asked, feeling a bit like a six-year-old. I wasn't sure I wanted to tell her that my mother had often stayed with me long into the night when I'd had a fever or other malady. But tonight, for some reason, a tiny part of me didn't want to be alone.

Marinette looked at me for a moment, then put the glasses down on the nightstand before turning off the light. I shifted to my side, and Marinette slid in behind me, then draped an arm across my chest. "Sweet dreams, my precious kitty," she whispered into a feline ear.

My only response was to snuggle into her a bit more and purr both of us to sleep.


	20. Moments

**Twenty: Moments**

_Author's Note: Chat's feeling better, thanks to the patient care of his girlfriend – and the benefits of being a quick-healing superhero._

_Special Note: As I am taking the plunge and doing the 2019 version of National November Write a Novel Month, I've created shorter chapters for the next few weeks so I can continue to provide fresh content while I am furiously working on that project. (Feel free to follow along if you like over on their website; I'll take all the support I can get!)_

* * *

I swam up through the layers of slumber until I was able to crack a masked eye and see the glimmer of sunshine as it poured through the sliding doors to my balcony. Smiling, I stretched slightly, somewhat constricted by both arms of Marinette that had somehow wrapped themselves around my torso. Without turning, I felt her head buried against my shoulder, still soundly asleep.

It was a pleasant situation, one that I was loath to upset, but I knew both of us had to get to work.

Gently, I started to try and slip out from her embrace, carefully moving her arms just enough; I made a bit of progress before realizing my tail (of all things) was trapped beneath her. I tried to tug at it only to discover she'd actually managed to wind it around herself. I was starting to understand Edna Mode's insistence on no capes now, but my tail wasn't purely decorative, either – as it's twisting-tapping in frustration against Marinette's arm indicated.

Sighing, I went for the last alternative. Using a claw, I tapped the bell at my collar several times, allowing it to ring out cheerfully.

Marinette started immediately. "Oh! Good morning!" she said groggily as she tried to pull away from me. "What time is it?"

"Late, I think," I laughed. "But I can't reach my baton to tell you for sure."

"Oh!" she said, suddenly realizing that she was entangled in my tail. "How—wow, sorry," she said sheepishly as she rolled out from under it.

"You've had me by the tail for some time, Princess," I quipped as I was finally able to push out of bed myself.

"Hah, hah," she said. "Not literally. How are you feeling today?" she asked as she pulled her hair back into a ponytail.

"Better," I said. "Hungry – but I'll pick up breakfast on the way to the office." Grabbing my baton, I raised a masked eyebrow. "Yikes. Maybe not!'

Her eyes widened at my expression. "How late are we?"

"Late. Late. Late."

Marinette said some very unladylike words and flew from the room. I vaulted out after her. "I offer express service this morning," I said from where I landed in my cat-crouch in the living room.

"I'm going to take you up on that," I heard from her room as she rustled through her closet and re-appeared reasonably well put together.

Without asking, I pulled her into my arms and bounded out through my room, hitting the railing to launch us into the early morning. Working my way efficiently through the sky, part of me noted that the streets below were quieter than normal at this hour but set it aside to ensure I got Marinette to her office as close to on time as I could. Dropping down on the rooftop across from her building, though, the lack of workers streaming into the high rise gave me pause.

"Mari," I asked carefully. "What day is it?"

Peeking around me, Marinette started to laugh. "Well," she said between chuckles. "If we leave now, maybe we can get the last set of fresh baguettes from the Bakery and have French Toast."

She didn't have to tell me twice. The prospect of spending a lazy Saturday with my girlfriend was too good to pass up; I pulled her into my arms and launched us toward breakfast.


	21. Black Chats and Witches

**Twenty-One: Black Chats and Witches**

_Author's Note: Marinette invites Chat to be her date at a Halloween-themed party celebrating the end of a very good month for her firm; Chat has some helpful ideas about who she should go as. Poor Marinette._

_(This was originally planned for Halloween but was delayed with my work on NaNoWriNo. It's also a little shorter as I broke it up into smaller chunks so it could appear while I was still working on that project.)_

* * *

I was whipping up some waffles for the two us, a pleasant start to a lazy Sunday morning in Paris. My apron had managed to keep the worst of my efforts off of the cool casual outfit Marinette had given me during my Chatversary, though I was pretty sure I'd left a streak of flour on the hoodie when I'd tried scratch an itch about where my feline ears would normally be. Despite generally not being transformed on the weekends at this point in our relationship, I still spent a considerable amount of time as Chat and had found the sympathetic feelings of phantom ears and tail hard to ignore.

As Marinette was still in her room, Plagg had stationed himself atop the flour bin and as usual was gleefully providing play-by-play commentary on my efforts. "These would be better with cheese," he said with cackle. "I'd be happy to share some of my stash with you."

I wrinkled my human nose. "I can't even begin to fathom what warmed Camembert would smell like, my tiny friend. But if you bring me a tiny slice, I'll make a special waffle just for you."

"Deal!" he said as he zipped away into our bedroom. A moment later, he appeared with one of his favorite brands, and deposited into the waiting waffle iron after I'd poured the last of the batter I'd mixed up into it. "Hurry… hurry…" Plagg said as he licked his chops and fastened his tiny green eyes on the light for the waffle iron. He might have even been rubbing his paws together in anticipation.

Trying not to laugh, I reminded him: "A watched iron never bakes."

"Whatever," he said, intent on his upcoming snack.

I washed up the last of my equipment and made sure the oven was still keeping the rest of my waffles at temperature, then set about squeezing some fresh orange juice for our mimosas.

"Now, Chat," Plagg suddenly said. He'd taken to calling me by my transformed name on the off chance that Marinette might overhear us.

I moved quickly to the iron and held my nose as I pulled the rather fragrant waffle from the iron and deposited on a plate. "Here," I said, narrowing my eyes. "Please take this to the balcony. Quickly."

"Come here, my beautiful," Plagg murmured lovingly as he took the plate and moved outside. I slowly shook my head, having further proof that getting between my kwami and his favorite foodstuff was danger incarnate.

I was nearly done scrubbing the cheese out of the iron when Marinette made her appearance. "Morning, Purrincess," I said as she came over and I kissed her.

"What is that _smell_?" she asked after she pulled away.

"I fed my kwami," I said simply.

She stared at the waffle iron I was drying. "I am never using that again. Ever."

I made a show of sniffing at it, much as I would if transformed. "I've gotten the worst out," I smiled.

"I don't trust your human nose," she said, bopping it playfully.

I smiled again. "Breakfast is ready when you are."

"Before we eat," Marinette said as she slipped onto a barstool. "I have a… favor to ask."

"Anything, Princess," I said. I had to catch myself, for normally I'd pop up on top of the counter and sit, cat-like. It was a running joke for her to shush me off the granite. But I wasn't as nimble as Adrien and instead leaned, Chat-like, against the edge.

"You might not say that." She sighed.

"Uh, oh."

"Yeah. So, look. We're doing a party to celebrate the last quarter of sales. Our partnership with House of Gabriel has driven our bottom line up quite a bit, so the bosses have rented out a ballroom at Le Grand Paris."

"You need me to stand watch or something? I can probably get Ladybug to help—"

"No, nothing quite like that." She flushed slightly. "It's… it's a Halloween party, so we're all supposed to dress up. Everyone is bringing their plus one, and the office is well aware that I am seeing someone."

"Nearly all of Paris does, thanks to Alya," I muttered, referring to the candid shots our friend had posted upon our return from Nice a few months back.

"Yeah, exactly. Look… you can totally say no…"

"I'll go."

"Chat…"

I moved around the counter and scooped her up into my arms, kissing her as I did so and trying not to look like I was struggling a bit to hold her (as I was currently lacking my super-strength). "I'll go, Purrincess."

Marinette smiled at me. "All right. Now, let's talk about costumes."

"That's easy," I said, "at least, for one of us."

She looked at me. "The whole point of a costume party is to come _in_ costume," she pointed out. "Your normal outfit—"

"Is a costume."

"True, but—"

"I'm not wearing anything else," I said firmly. "Especially if we are out and about together. I can't afford to not be transformed."

"But—"

"So what are you wearing, then?" I asked, purposefully changing the direction of the discussion.

"I don't know," she said dejectedly. "Hand me my waffles and we'll think through it a bit."

"Go as me," I said as I put her back on the barstool and hopped around to pull the plates out of the oven. "That costume you made for yourself would be purrfect."

"Hell no," she said flatly. "I made that just for you."

"That's not what you said at the time," I reminded her with an arched eyebrow. "Besides, you look great in form-fitting spandex. Purrhaps better than one other woman I know," I added, waggling my eyebrows at her.

Marinette flushed. "I can't wear that."

"Then go as Ladybug," I suggested. "It would be a perfect—"

"Absolutely not," she said firmly.

"Why not?" I asked. "You could whip one up in no time flat."

"No," she said curtly. "Moving on."

"How about another Miraculous Holder? Rena? Queen Bee?"

"No!"

"Carapace?"

"No!" she nearly yelled.

My eyes widened. "All right," I said, realizing I might have pushed her a bit but also unsure why she was reacting the way she was. "Then let's try a different angle. I'm a black cat. Maybe you could be a witch, and I'll be your familiar."

She considered me for a moment, and then that brilliant smile I loved made an appearance. "I like that. Okay, let me noodle some designs."

"Good," I smiled. "I still think Lady—"

"Knock it off, Chat."

"As you wish," I said.


	22. Full Moons, Black Chats and Witches

**Twenty-Two: Full Moons, Black Chats and Witches**

_Author's Note: Chat and Marinette encounter more than they expect at the Halloween Office party when an akuma makes use of the full moon on All Hallow's Eve. Unfortunately, Ladybug appears to be MIA and unable to assist._

* * *

Shards of glass rained down around me as I hit the sidewalk outside of Le Grand Hotel; I tried to roll out of the impact and away from the akuma, but it grabbed my tail and threw me back into the main lobby with such force, my only option was to protectively curl into a ball as I smashed into the mirrored wall on the far side of the lobby. What was left of the very cute cowboy costume Marinette had made for me to wear over my traditional Chat costume was in tatters; I had no idea what had become of the ten-gallon cowboy hat she'd modified so my feline ears could be accommodated.

My outfit had been a last minute change; I'd held firm on not wanting to wear anything other than my normal Chat costume, but she'd surprised me with her hand-crafted cowboy ensemble at the eleventh hour, and sold it with her version of Doll Eyes, well aware that I couldn't refuse her anything. But I had a price, too, that she'd reluctantly paid.

As I slid down to the floor, winded for the moment, I shredded the remainder the checked shirt and blue jeans with my claws and leapt out of the way of a potted plant that had been targeted at my head. The screams of the guests fleeing the pandemonium reverberated through the space and forced me to flatten my feline ears a bit in order to concentrate. Leaping up to the mezzanine balcony rimming the lobby, I perched on the railing and tried to recall that this was _supposed_ to have been a celebratory evening for Marinette and her co-workers.

Instead, the party had taken an unusual twist when a bona fide Wicked Witch appeared, broomstick and all, and started swooping through the ballroom tossing candy at the shrieking attendees from a small bag. The unfortunate guests hit by the candy instantly mutated into what appeared to be a low-budget horror movie sheet-with-two-holes-for-eyes ghosts, floating a few feet off the ground; the fortunate ones that avoided the candy had scattered to the four winds, but not before many of them came into contact with one or more of the floating ghosts and joined their ranks as a result.

When the witch and her broom had sailed into the ballroom, I'd quickly grabbed Marinette and dashed from the space, stashing her in a small closet off of the kitchen that I'd used a few times for transforming. She'd protested all the way, and had even said a few unladylike phrases when I locked her in. I wasn't about to let my girlfriend get anywhere close to this mess; returning to the ballroom and seeing the ensuing chaos seemed to have validated my decision.

Twenty minutes into the melee, though, I was starting to worry; Ladybug was seldom late when an akuma appeared, and to be honest, I was running out of places to hide. What little was left of the ballroom was a smoke-filled mess; the cold October wind was whistling through the massive holes and missing plate glass windows of the lobby, and the shorting electrical system was plunging the space into darkness at random intervals.

In short, it felt like a very creepy Haunted Mansion.

So far, I'd managed to keep the amazingly fast-moving akuma from taking out too many additional victims; as per normal, she had been focused primarily on subduing me and removing my Miraculous, allowing me to keep her occupied long enough to clear the scene. As the final panicked guests moved out into the night, I turned my masked visage on my opponent only to see she was swooping toward me; somewhat appropriate to my former costume, she seemed to be twirling a lasso of black licorice, and I decided it would be best not to be easy to catch.

I tumbled forward off the mezzanine and used my baton to spring around her; she caught my move, though, and managed to bank her broom into a hard arc, snagging one of my boots in the process with her lasso. Yanking, she sent me flying up and away from the granite floor. I hit the side of the mezzanine's pony wall face-first and upside down, forcefully enough that I lost my grip on the baton and was seeing stars in my vision. My angle had loosened the lasso from my boot, but that only meant I was rapidly falling toward the floor head-first.

Not desiring to become a Chat-pancake, I curled into a ball and rotated as best as I could, managing to hit the floor feet-first, but hard enough that my right ankle went sideways at an insanely wrong angle. Intense pain shot up my leg and I gasped, nearly collapsing in agony, but managed to stay upright long enough to vault on my good leg out of the incoming attack from the akuma.

I landed on top of the reception desk and slid over the slick marble, digging in my claws just enough to arrest my movement so I could curl under the countertop. Chloe had often used the spot over the years to avoid just about everything, though I knew the akuma would be on me in seconds. With Ladybug MIA and all of the civilians accounted for, I needed to get out of there, and fast.

Cocking my head, I listened carefully to see if I could determine what was below me; it sounded empty, but there was still too much noise from the akuma and the hordes of ghost things moving through the space. As much as I didn't want to use Cataclysm to escape, it seemed like the only avenue left.

Raising my hand, I started to activate my superpower only to have my masked eyes fall upon my baton. It had rolled over and against the doorway leading to the kitchen. It was a much-needed reminder that someone I cared about was still hiding back there. In an instant I changed course.

Gritting my teeth, I leapt away from the counter and over a legion of sheets swarming toward me; the pain of my broken ankle was nearly overwhelming. I landed in a tuck and roll, grabbing my baton as I rolled by it, and then stayed on all fours (well, three and a half) to dash down the hallway toward Marinette.

The door to the closet was still closed. While I was surprised Marinette hadn't gotten out, I also knew she wasn't safe any longer. Quickly I tore the door from its hinges and tossed it against the ghosts that had followed me. "Time to go, Princess," I said.

Marinette was sitting on top of a stack of paper towels in her Chat Noir costume, angrily twirling her tail. I took a moment to appreciate the fine curves it showed off before seeing she still had steam coming out of her ears; she tamped down whatever she was going to say, though, when her eyes saw me favoring my ankle, and the odd angle of my foot.

"Holy Hell," she breathed as she dropped down to take a closer look, all traces of anger gone. "How are you even moving?"

"Sheer determination." I held out my paw. "I'm going to get you out of here and to a safe place, and then see if I can figure out where Ladybug has gotten to."

"I can take—"

"I know, but I'm pulling the anxious boyfriend card." I grimaced as another bout of pain shot through my foot.

"Chat, you can't protect me like this," she said.

"I can," I said with more certainty than I felt. "Come on."

She nodded and took my paw; grinding my teeth now, I hobbled to what was left of the door and saw the coast was reasonably clear before starting to dash down toward the kitchen. I made it as far as the double doors to the kitchen before landing on my bad foot awkwardly. Yelping in pain, I pitched forward through the silver double doors and slid on my chest across the industrial linoleum before coming to rest against the emergency exit.

"Out," I hissed through my clenched teeth. "Call… call for help."

"Chat-"

"_Go_," I commanded as I flipped around. "Ladybug will appear. She always does."

Marinette kissed me between the ears and then pushed through the door and was gone.

I sagged against the doorframe and popped open my baton. As I speed dialed Ladybug, I could hear the whisper of the ghost things as they entered the kitchen, and further behind them, the telltale whooshing of the broomstick.

"C'mon Ladybug," I prayed. "Now would be a good time to magically show up…"


	23. Sobering Reality Check

**Twenty-Three: Sobering Reality Check**

_Author's Note: Having unwittingly locked Ladybug in a closet and consequently seriously injuring his ankle, Chat finds himself shorthanded against a Halloween-themed akuma._

* * *

Frustrated that I still couldn't reach Ladybug, I snapped my baton into halves and hurled them at the onrushing ghost-like creatures. Predictably, they simply parted around the weapons as they carved a pathway through the room. I wasn't particularly hoping to disable any; instead, it was more of a distraction tactic, allowing me to scrabble my way across the industrial linoleum toward a massive mixer. Not entirely sure what I might do with said mixer, I leaned a shoulder into it and managed to move the bowl off its base, grimacing with the effort against my bad ankle.

I captured the halves of the baton as they returned to my waiting paws and reconnected them, then extended it enough to push myself into a stand. Planting myself firmly and ignoring the shockwaves as they reverberated through what I now knew was broken ankle, I gripped both sides to the massive silver bowl and decided a bit of physicality was in order. Growling with a mixture of frustration and pain, I hoisted the bowl with my super strength and sent it sailing through the air, using my feline hearing to time the toss just as the Wicked Witch burst through double doors.

Not waiting to see if I was even remotely successful, I quickly extended the baton again, rising to the ceiling. My bowl hit its mark with a resoundingly satisfactory _thud_, and the Witch screamed in anger as she fell to the floor in a heap of wicker and fabric. Fortunately for this overgrown cat, there was a well-built HVAC hood over the space; as the Witch tried to regain her footing, I extended the baton even further to push myself through the grill an into the duct above.

Using my claws, I hauled myself over the edge of the perpendicular connecting duct and then crawled on paws and knees away from what was left of the grill as fast as I could. I'd just rounded the corner of a T-intersection when the Wicked Witch appeared in the space, hovering on her broom. Cackling wildly, she tossed some of that innocent looking but insanely dangerous candy corn at me; it scattered along the metallic walls, reverberating through the space.

For once, I was at a loss for puns, my entire focus on getting as far away from danger as I could. My ears were flattened against my mane, frantic masked eyes making the most of my night vision in an attempt to escape. Another T-intersection appeared, and I paused for a fraction of a second before darting left; the floor to the right exploded as the Witch again appeared, having come up from a room below. Pulse pounding, I tried to listen again as I moved as fast as my injured ankle would allow. Another right, another left, and I was pretty sure I'd put some distance between me and the kitchen.

Witch surprised me one more time, having somehow gotten to a room at the same level as the duct and bursting in through a grill a moment after I'd skittered past her. I tried hard to ignore how confining the space was, focusing instead on the steady increase in what was outside air, replacing the very smoky smell trailing me from behind.

Turning one last corner, I encountered the fan for this level, which had direct access to an alleyway behind Le Grand Hotel. The massive blades were still turning, albeit slowly, but fast enough that they would easily slice me in half without a second thought in a really bad version of an _Indiana Jones _-style temple booby trap. Using my claws, I frantically peeled back the grill that was protecting the fan from the inside, then leveraged my baton between two blades to seize up the motor. While the engine started to overheat, smoking and sparking in protest, I went to work on the exterior grill with my claws, hoping beyond hope that the Wicked Witch hadn't gained access to the plans of the hotel and had guessed my exit. Claws, then boots, then claws again, but my progress was agonizingly slow, and with my ankle, agonizingly painful.

Just as I thought my trusty baton was about to give up the ghost (pun intended), the exterior grill gave way and I slid through in a quick motion, grabbing my baton as I exited. I tried to extend it to gracefully reach the concrete but mistimed it, landing will full force on my ankle.

My vision went white, then stars, then black for a moment as I keeled over into a fetal position, curling around the injury. It took every ounce of willpower I had left not to mewl miserably and sob with the pain. When my vision cleared, I could see the ankle was no longer remotely viable; fortunately, the compression of my costume (and the magically infinite flexibility it also had) seemed to be keeping the fracture splinted and the swelling reasonable. But even the fact that I _could_ tell it was misshapen was a bad sign, even with my quick healing abilities.

At that particular moment, my baton chirped.

Sliding it into phone mode, and grinding my teeth against the throbbing pain, I saw my partner. She was clearly running from somewhere. "Chat! Where are you?"

"Alley…" I said. "Behind the… hotel," I added, each word a fight against the blinding pain.

"Can you move?"

"No," and this time I did mewl. "I'm a sitting… cat…" I replied. "I'm sorry."

She may have replied, but my world blacked out again. When I returned to some semblance on sentience, I was staring at the stars, my back on the tiles of a roof. A vaguely fox-like face appeared, and it occurred to me that I should know who it was.

"Chat?"

"Rena," I said. "How long…?" I got out before groaning again.

"Just a few minutes," she said, lifting my head up slightly. "LB is down there with Viperion, Cap and Pegasus," she said, and the worry in her expression told me it wasn't going well. "I drew the short straw," Rena added, trying for humor.

"Sorry," I smiled. "Cats are needy by – oh, damn, that hurts," I mewled again.

"I don't doubt it," she said. "Your costume is keeping it more or less stabilized, but we need to get you to a doctor."

I rolled my eyes. "Not really an option for a superhero," I managed to get out before squeezing my eyes against the pain and letting the world go away again.

This time I came back partially a few times, catching snatches of conversation. I was reasonably sure that Ladybug and the rest of the crew had returned, which should have indicated they'd defeated the akuma; fading out again, though I wasn't entirely sure if that was true or not. I woke with a start when someone put their hands on my ankle, the searing white pain enough to shoot me through with adrenaline. I may or may not have also sworn in several languages simultaneously.

"Chat," Ladybug said. "Are you with me?"

In a haze, I could see she was beside me, cradling my head in her arms. I nodded. "Yes, Milady," I said weakly. "I made a mess of this."

"Parts," she smiled softly. "But not all. You cleared the building and got everyone to safety. That's quite a feat for anyone with two working ankles."

"Still—"

"Hush and listen to me," she said urgently; I picked up the urgent chirping of her earrings as she continued. "I still need to call the Miraculous Cure, but I'm not certain it will repair your ankle. It _should_ since it happened as a result of the akuma, but if it doesn't, I'm going to have to take you to that doctor we know. Do you understand?"

I nodded.

"I'm going to need help getting you there, so Viperion and Cap are recharging their kwamis now. We don't have a choice, we'll need to go en masse."

"She'll be… okay with it," I said.

Gently, Ladybug brushed back a sweaty lock of my wild mane. My costume generally regulated my body temperature, so it was another sign of extremes; this night had been full of new experiences. "Here we go."

I nodded again.

"Miraculous Ladybug!" she cried as she tossed what looked like trick-or-treat bag into the air. The night sky burst into red-and-white light, and her millions of helpers swarmed the city, including no little amount that encircled my injured ankle.

I could feel a bit of a weird tingling that became insistent and intense; for a brief moment, a massive jolt of pain hit me like a ton of bricks, causing the world to go away once more. This time I was definitely out for a longer period, for when I awoke, I was in my own bed back at the apartment.

Blinking, I realized it was still night and still dark; I could smell the odd but strangely purrfect perfume Marinette had worn for years now and shifted slightly to see she was curled up against a pillow facing me. "Princess?" I asked quietly.

Her eyes popped open immediately, and she reached back to turn on the light on the nightstand. Sitting up, she smiled warmly. "Feeling better?" she asked.

Doing a bit of a mental and physical inventory, I realized the insane pain had receded to a dull ache; gingerly, I tried to swivel my ankle and only felt a vague twinge – the only remnant that it had been injured, really. "Much," I said, a bit amazed. "It feels a bit tender, though." I looked back at my girlfriend. "How…?"

"Ladybug," she said simply. "She was here when I got back from the hotel. I was going nuts when you weren't answering your baton," she said pointedly, "so I just about hit the floor when I saw her in the living room. I assumed it was really bad news."

My eyes widened. "Oh, Mari – I had no way to tell you—"

"I know," she said, "she told me everything. It took both her and Viperion to get you back to the apartment, and then she stayed behind to keep watch over you until I returned."

I pulled her close, feeling tears nipping at my eyes. "I _am_ sorry," I said. "I guess this is the closest we've come yet to the worst-case scenario, given my superhero gig."

"Too close, if you ask me," she said, putting her head into my chest. "I'm not sure I'd like a repeat of this. Anytime. Ever. Again."

I stroked her hair, still somewhat amazed that Ladybug had managed to both fix my ankle and assuage my girlfriend's worst fears. "We did talk about this," I said gently. "Until my time is done as Chat, there is a real possibility I might vault out into the night and never return."

"I know," she said, her voice muffled by the fabric on my chest. "I knew exactly what I was signing up for when I committed to this relationship." Marinette looked up. "And for the record, I've not changed my mind."

"Good," I said, purring slightly. "Because I'm not intending to give up being Chat anytime soon."

"That is a truism if I've ever heard one," she chuckled. "Nor would I want you to give it up."

I thought for a long moment, then added, "I would give it up. For you."

She pushed back from my chest. "What?"

"Being Chat. If I had to choose between being Chat and being in love with you?" I ran a claw through her hair. "You'd win. Every time."

The look of shock on her face had me a bit worried. "You'd do that? Seriously? Give up all that Chat gives you?"

"Yes," I said without hesitation.

"Wow," she said as she settled back into my chest. "Well, the good news is, I like you in black spandex."

I rolled my eyes. "For the millionth time—"

"I know," she laughed, "but my point is, I won't make you choose. Ever." She looked at me, those deep blue eyes blazing with love. "If you give up being a superhero, it will be for another reason entirely – especially given how Chat is such a part of who you are."

"It's me either way," I replied. "I'm just more me with the mask and feline ears."

"And insanely cute with them, too," she laughed. Waiting for a beat, she added playfully, "Not that I would mind leaving the worry behind."

"I know," I said as I pulled her close to me again. "Me, too."


	24. MariChatmas

**Twenty-Four: MariChatmas**

_Author's Note: While still recuperating from his severely broken ankle, Chat finds himself watching Christmas movies on Netflix… and begins to recall the very first official kiss he had with Marinette – the one that started them done the path toward being a couple._

* * *

_Special note: This idea was suggested by a reader following my companion work, _Kitty Love_, which is something of a prequel to _Roommates_. That story inadvertently skips right over this key aspect of their relationship, as Chat has repeatedly (and daily) reminded me since seeing the comment, so in the interests of appeasing my feline friend (and sneaking in more snuggle time for him with his Princess), I present the following. –ep_

* * *

Marinette had insisted that I keep off my ankle as much as possible for a few days; despite my protests that work was piling up on my civilian alter-ego's desk, and the fact I had quick healing abilities, she was firmly insistent, going so far as to plant herself in front of my balcony doors to prevent my escape. I'd resigned myself to her request with the stipulation that I at least be able to work on my laptop, a condition she had acquiesced to fairly quickly.

I spent the first day on the couch, laying sideways with my costumed boot up on a pillow. We'd both agreed the process would go faster if I stayed transformed, especially after I'd had a few quiet moments to confer with Plagg. I felt badly about keeping him cooped up in the ring when Marinette was at work, but he assured me that Marinette would be making it up to him, though he was quick to avoid telling me what that might entail exactly. Not for the first time did I feel like he was as smitten with Marinette as I was.

It was a long, boring day, mostly replying to emails and signing off on design ideas. Fortunately, I only had one conference call, and I managed to experience "significant technical difficulties" that prevented my webcam from working properly. The slight change in my voice due to being transformed was also easily explained away to the "cold" that had kept me out of the office that day.

Plagg's efforts to make me better at prevaricating were proceeding well, it seemed.

Day two, however, I ran out of things to do. While I wasn't generally a hands-on manager, I did spend a fair amount of my day wandering and checking in with people, from designers to the bean counters in Finance. As Father continued to stay in recluse mode, I felt it was wise to check the pulse of our organization regularly. Over my first six months as an "official" director, I'd found it had made people more willing to discuss their ideas with me and even be more forthcoming about the internal troubles we were experiencing. Some I had been able to smooth out, but others – like our dowdy and dated designs – were a bit harder to sort, though I felt strongly I was making progress. Our Christmas campaign that year was a good example; for the first time in five years, sales of House of Gabriel merchandise had increased.

Most of my photo shoots had been cancelled as well, which made up the rest of my time at the office. By mid-afternoon on the second day, I was bored. Bored enough that I couldn't even seem to drop off into a catnap, which was a bit unusual.

I swiveled on the couch and set the laptop down on the coffee table; thinking about the Christmas campaign made me smile slightly, and I picked up my tablet to fire up Netflix. Just as I suspected, all of my favorite Christmas movies had appeared, and I happily spent the next few minutes scrolling through my old friends. I'd shared my love of classic American movies with Marinette early on in our relationship and knew that she'd completely enjoy letting her hair down that evening, relaxing into my chest as she enjoyed a glass of wine and one of my holiday favorites. I found myself purring at the thought of the two of us cozily wrapped into each other for a few hours.

My claw pawsed over _Christmas in Connecticut_, a movie from the Golden Age of Hollywood that starred Barbara Stanwyk. While my heart belonged with Ingrid Bergman, Barbara Stanwyk ran a close second – well, third, I suppose, if Lauren Bacall was added to the mix. I found myself shaking with laughter, comparing the wonderful actresses as I was. Fortunately, Marinette was well aware of my (unrequited) love for them.

Like most streaming platforms, Netflix took my momentary distraction to start playing the movie; it had apparently been paused from our last watching right at the scene where Ms. Stanwyk attempts to make a flapjack. In an instant, I was transported back to the very first time the two of us had watched the movie, for it had led to our very first official kiss.

It was the last Christmas I was a student at Dupont with Marinette; we had just one semester left before leaving the cozy confines of Dupont and heading to Lycée. Marinette had yet to discover that Adrien was going to be eschewing the uber-exclusive private Lycée in favor of following her and our friends – my alter ego wanting to save that disclosure for nearer the end of the semester. As Chat, of course, I had been rather circumspect as to whether I'd even been _attending _school, but was reasonably certain despite my efforts to camouflage my homework, she'd determined I was likely at the same level as her.

Curled up on her chaise in her room, Marinette was snuggled into my chest and holding her tablet. It had snowed overnight, making Christmas day this wonderfully white postcard version of Paris; I'd taken the long way to the Bakery after the microsecond Father spent with me exchanging gifts at the mansion, pausing in a few places to appreciate just how beautiful the city had become. Marinette knew I was going to essentially be alone in Christmas – I'd been pretty up front with her early on that my civilian home life was pretty awful – and she'd invited me to spend the day with her family instead.

I'd dithered on accepting for a day or so as I was still sensitive to having akumatized her father months earlier – well prior to when we'd _actually_ started dating for real. But Marinette had assured me that her family would welcome me warmly, and from the moment I'd landed at their front door that Christmas day, I knew she had spoken the truth. They'd treated me to a fabulous Christmas Day feast – more food on one table than I typically saw in a full year at the mansion.

Fortunately, my costume smoothly adjusted to my rather overwhelmed stomach, but my other cat tendencies began to manifest. Marinette noted my heavily-lidded feline eyes and massive yawns I was issuing while still at the table and had quickly taken me by the paw up the steps to her room and set me up on her chaise. I was out nearly instantly, waking some hours later when she wafted freshly-baked Belgian chocolate croissants beneath my feline nose.

That led to us becoming coiled together around her tablet, and my suggestion to watch _Christmas in Connecticut_. I'd screened it numerous times but it had been her first, and I enjoyed watching her experience it, smiling as she laughed at the humor, and cried with her when it looked like all was lost for the main character. We then laughed and cried happy tears at the admittedly predictable but nonetheless heartwarming ending.

It was after final credits had rolled that it happened.

We were pretty much intertwined in each other from having watched the movie together, and in the process of trying to carefully extricate myself without snagging a claw in her clothing, I discovered Marinette was entangled in my tail. I'd let it gently rest atop her thigh when we'd first settled in, but somehow, she'd managed to wind it around her like a seat belt. It didn't hurt, obviously, but the tiny bit of the end that was still free was tapping against the chaise, telegraphing my frustration. Not wanting to yank it out from under her (and tumble Marinette to the ground in the process), I tried to shift myself a bit and found I was pretty much held in place.

"Princess," I said after a few additional subtle attempts to release my tail, "I appear to be stuck."

"Really?" she replied as she looked down. "Oh! How did that happen?"

"I don't know," I said, trying to shift again and getting nowhere. "You need to turn a bit so I can free it."

"Okay," she said and obliged by twisting the _wrong_ way and succeeding in cinching my tail tighter around her. I gasped slightly as it also tightened a bit uncomfortably around _me_, but her movement had the net effect of drawing the two of us closer – so close, in fact, that my masked nose was but a few millimeters away from her face.

"Uh…" I started to say before losing myself in the beautiful blue depths of her eyes. I was staring at her sideways, of course, since I'd been leaning on a shoulder, but it didn't lessen the effect.

Time slowed down as some sort of final piece clicked into place deep within my heart. The longer the two of us had been dating, the more certain I'd become that Marinette was my soulmate; it had taken me some time to get to that point, though, for I'd been pretty conflicted over Ladybug. In that small sliver of a moment, I found myself adjusting one more time and carefully closed the remaining distance to gently press my lips to Marinette's.

Worried that she wasn't feline exactly the same, it was a brief but meaningful kiss, just enough for me to taste the strawberry lip gloss she loved while telling her I was interested in taking our relationship beyond simple friendship - but not enough that she'd feel pressured into reciprocating. Pulling away, though, I found my movement halted; she'd managed to get a hand behind my mane, and to my surprise, _pulled_ me toward her.

The second kiss held all of the fireworks the first had skipped, and led to a third, and then something of a more frantic series, as if the emotional dam each of us had been using to hold back our feelings had cracked and tumbled away behind the force of our acceptance. When time restarted for me, we were still snuggled closely together, but without the feeling of separation we'd had at the beginning of the day.

Now we felt as though we were one.

Breathing heavily, I asked carefully, "What just happened?"

"I think, kitty, we've crossed a bridge to a new country," Marinette said quietly. "One that I've long wanted to visit, but was unsure you were willing to travel to."

Running a claw through her pigtail, I found myself asking: "You were waiting? For me?"

"Of course," she said, like it was self-evident. "I knew you felt the way you did about me, but _you_ had to realize it yourself. Otherwise, it won't work between us."

I thought about that and intrinsically knew she was right. "I love you," I said simply. "I truly do. And I think I have for a while now."

"I know," she laughed. "And I've loved you for quite some time, too." She kissed me again quickly.

"I'm going to remember this day for a while," I said happily. "The day it was official."

"Me, too," she said. "But I suspect this still needs to be on the down low."

"Yes," I nodded sadly. "And I'll have to tell Ladybug that it's gotten serious between us." I frowned a bit. "Hopefully she'll be as accepting of this stage as she was when I told her I was hanging out with you. As a friend."

Marinette smiled. "Just be honest, and I'm sure she will."

Staring at the freeze-frame of Barbara Stanwyk and the flapjack, lost in my memory of our first _true_ kiss, I was momentarily startled when my baton started to chime. Popping it into phone mode, I saw Marinette's face appear on the small screen. "Hey beautiful," I smiled. "I was just thinking about you."

"Were you now," she smiled. "Staying on the couch, I trust?" she asked.

"Yes, Princess," I said, rolling my eyes.

"Good. Because I'm bringing home some kitty treats baked especially for you by maman."

I smiled wider. "That sounds lovely. When will you be home?"

"In about twenty. I'm just leaving the Bakery now."

"Pawsome," I laughed. "This domesticated kitty can't wait to see you."


	25. Feline the Holidays

**Twenty-Five: Feline the Holidays**

_Author's Note: When Chat discovers an unmarked bottle in one of the kitchen cabinets, his curiosity gets the better of him – much to Marinette's chagrin._

* * *

_Special note: While this installment was inspired by a recent trip to the veterinarian with my own feline fur babies, no actual Chats were harmed in the writing of this chapter… although he is a little pissed at me. I told Chat I'll make it up to him in the next chapter._

* * *

I cooled my feline boots for about a week after breaking my ankle before Marinette _finally_ allowed me to go back to work. In reality, it had pretty much healed in less than four days but my girlfriend had insisted I stay off it as long as possible, while rightly pointing out I'd not actually taken any vacation time since our trip to Nice some months earlier.

My counter that I was saving my time to take her somewhere special for New Year's didn't pass muster. So I spent the back half of the week finalizing the details of our getaway, with daily reminders to Marinette to ensure she blocked the time off herself. Left unsaid – for obvious reasons – was I could take time whenever I needed, owing to my position at House of Gabriel.

A month and a half later – and less than two weeks out from Christmas - I landed on my balcony and leapt into my room after a long Friday at the office. I was looking forward to a weekend of Christmas shopping with Marinette, though I was still having trouble firming up what to get her. She'd not hinted about anything per se. which had begun to frustrate me to no end. Even crouched there on my bedroom floor, my tail twisted at the thought of how unusually resistant to my charm she had been in this one area.

My baton buzzed as I was contemplating my next move and I pulled it out. Marinette appeared on the slightly higher definition screen Plagg had recently added; it made her vibrant blue eyes all the prettier. "Princess." I smiled.

"Hey kitty," she said. "Alya called last minute and wants to go for drinks. She scored a major interview with some notable from the United States and, accordingly, a celebration is in order."

"That's pawsome!" I said, knowing how hard our friend had been working to secure the coveted "get" for the news service she worked for.

"Are you okay on your own tonight?" she asked. "I know we usually do something on Fridays."

"I'll be fine," I said. "I'll perch on the balcony railing caterwauling until you get back, of course. But I'll be fine."

Marinette rolled her eyes. "There's a fresh bottle of red in the cabinet. Use it to sooth your hurting heart."

"If I must," I said, putting a paw to my forehead.

"Incorrigible," she laughed. "Don't wait up."

I kissed her image and then clicked off. Standing, I slid the baton to the small of my back and moved out into the kitchen, scratching my chin with a claw thoughtfully. I'd originally planned on crepes with shredded pork and sour cream, but didn't feel like going through the effort for just one; consequently, I found myself with the refrigerator door open, considering what I had in the leftover department that could go into the microwave in a jiffy. Tapping my claws against the metal, I decided eggs sounded good and pulled them out, along with what was left of a bell pepper and some shredded cheddar.

Setting my items on the counter, I moved to the cabinet that had my olive oil and pulled the door open only to find it was missing; frowning, I moved to the next cabinet, and then the next, wondering if either of us had accidentally stashed it in the wrong spot. With two chefs in the kitchen, and two different cooking styles (though, admittedly, Marinette had taught me everything I knew), it wasn't unusual for us to misplace the odd spice or spatula.

On my fourth try, I found my olive oil stashed beside several other liquids. Pulling it out, my feline nose picked up a faint whisper of something I'd never smelled before; intrigued, I put the olive oil down on the granite countertop and started to root around in the space. Two bottles were clearly marked as sesame oil and vinegar, respectively, but the third bottle was unmarked and had a small decorative ribbon around the top.

My masked eyes watched the amber liquid as I rotated it my paws; it was too watery for an oil, but didn't adhere to the sides of the bottle like a vinegar, either. Tentatively, I sniffed the bottle once more and came up with that fragrance again; considering how large my scent catalog was these days, it struck me as odd that I'd not come across it in my travels as Chat. Putting aside the other bottles, I narrowed my masked eyes a bit, trying to see if there had even _been_ a label on the bottle in the first place; about the only evidence was the ribbon, making me think it was some high-end truffle-oil like substance where the tag had been artistically tied to the neck.

Oddly, the fragrance didn't seem food-like to me, but I wasn't getting enough of it to identify it properly, either. My initial guess was Marinette had opened it, gotten some on her hands, and the residue was what I was smelling from the outside of the glass. Sniffing even more carefully, I was reasonably sure I could determine how she'd been holding it.

There was a simple cork in the top, and I inserted a claw to cleanly pop it out. Leaning down, I took a sniff… and immediately felt this warm, comfortable sensation wash over me.

_Sweet kwami_, I thought, my masked eyes flying wide open.

For I'd only felt something like that on a few other occasions – when an akuma had intentionally tried to take me down with some pretty potent catnip. Ladybug had managed to get me clear, but not before I'd become more of a liability than a partner.

I tried to put the bottle back down, but that fragrance was… amazing. Unable to stop myself, I'd took an even deeper breath, and the amazing calm I'd started to experience deepened. Within a matter of moments, I was feeling as chill as I had ever felt before in my life; unlike the catnip, however, I was totally aware of myself and my surroundings in this sort of hypersensitive yet low-key state.

The next few hours passed amazingly well; Marinette found me lounging atop the breakfast counter, one paw wrapped lovingly around the bottle, my head leaning on the other, tail gently swishing back and forth to music only I could apparently hear. She took one look at me and her jaw dropped. "Chat…?"

"Did you know I can hear the couple in the apartment upstairs?" I asked her eagerly. "They seem to be having a disagreement over the best Pinot Noir in the city." I shook my head. "I had no idea they could argue for hours over such things."

Marinette's eyes hit on the bottle. "Have you been drinking?" she asked as she approached.

"No," I said. "In fact, I poured myself a glass of wine but never touched it." I pointed a claw tip to the glass. "It's there on the counter if you want it."

Her blue eyes came up to mine. "Your eyes… have you had catnip?"

"No," I smiled. "Why would I? You of all people know what it does to me."

She looked at the bottle again. "What is that?"

"This?" I replied, looking down. "I don't know, but it smells amazing," I said as I took in another lungful.

"Where did you find it?" she asked as she gently pried it out of my paw.

"It was in the cabinet," I said, lazily pointing to the door that was still ajar. Somewhat shocked, I realized the eggs and other items I'd taken out from the fridge were still on the counter. "Oops," I said, smiling. "I was going to make dinner and kinda forgot."

Marinette took a sniff of the bottle and looked at me. "I don't smell anything," she said, arching an eyebrow. "Where was this again?"

"That cabinet, next to the olive oil and vinegar."

"Vinegar?" She let out a gasp and put a hand to her mouth, trying to hide a smile.

"What's so funny about vinegar?" I asked. "I love it on salads, but I've never used it in a pun."

Marinette moved around to the back of the counter and corked the bottle; for some reason, it made me sad. "I think you've had enough of this," she said as she made for her bedroom. "I'll be back in a minute."

"I'll be here," I smiled again.

She was only gone for a few moments; when she returned, she pulled me down for a kiss and then rechecked my eyes again. "How are you feeling."

"Fabulous," I said. "Like I have no worries at all."

Marinette sighed. "This is my fault, kitty. Want some coffee? I'll explain as I make you dinner."

"You don't have to do that, Purrincess," I said.

"Yeah, I do," she laughed.

One cup of coffee later, I was on one of barstools and feeling less centered than earlier. My masked feline eyes were watching carefully as Marinette replaced the eggs and started my omelet. "So," she started. "You remember the Christmas party we had at the office earlier this week?"

I nodded. "How could I forget? I've been eating leftover salad for days now."

She smiled. "Funny story. Several of the other ladies I work with know I'm dating you."

"No surprise there."

"No," she said, and I could see her face flushing slightly as she giggled. "But they got me what they _thought_ was a cool joke gift. Something I could use to… control you."

My masked eyes narrowed a bit and for the first time in a few hours, I felt a little more like myself. "Control?" I laughed a little nervously. "I'm already putty in your hands. What more could you want?"

"I know," she laughed. "Anyway, I thanked them and shoved it in the bag I'd used to bring the salad supplies." The flush crept higher on her face. "I must have stashed it with the vinegar and oil."

"What was it, exactly, Princess?" I asked, arching an eyebrow. "Some sort of aphrodisiac?" I paused for a beat. "I thought being in black leather-"

"No," she said quickly cutting me off with a good-natured glare. "Pheromones."

"Pheromones," I repeated. "Why do I feline I should know what those are?"

"Technically, that bottle is artificial," she explained as she flipped my omelet over and slid it onto plate. "That particular one is popular with veterinarians, apparently, for it calms cats down and makes them rather… pliant… during appointments."

The other masked eyebrow went up. "Really," I said. "Well, if I needed any further proof how cat-like I've become, there it is."

Sliding the plate across to me, she nodded. "So it worked, then?"

"I already do everything you ask me to do, Purrincess," I reminded her with a sly smile. "But purrhaps. I certainly felt quite centered and very Zen-like. Extremely relaxed, but not fuzzy around the edges like catnip makes me feel." I took a bite of my omelet. "This is wonderful," I said, before adding, "and you're planning on disposing of that bottle, right?"

Her eyes danced with merriment. "I was originally, but now that I know it is effective…" she said, trailing off wickedly.

I paused for a moment, tapping my tail thoughtfully against the barstool. Marinette continued to smile, and then saw something in my face. "Hang on—" she said, her eyes growing wide.

Instantly, I was over the counter, trailing a _meowrrrr_ in my wake, and had bundled her up into my arms; slowly, I started to rub my face against hers, ramping up my purring as I drew tiny little circles around her belly-button with a claw tip.

Marinette let out a startled gasp and dropped the spatula she'd been holding; as it clanged to the floor, she twisted around and locked her lips on mine. Parting a few minutes later, she asked between heavy breaths, "What brought this on? Don't you want dinner?"

"Aftereffects," I said, momentarily pausing my purring as I stared lovingly into her deep blue eyes. "For some reason, I'd like to skip straight to dessert."

Cackling wildly, Marinette pulled me back down to her again for a kiss, but not before adding: "There's no way I'm getting rid of that stuff now…"


	26. Ice Skating

**Twenty-Six: Ice Skating**

_Author's Note: This was the second story I wrote for these characters during #MariChatMay2019. Having been a bit surprised at how popular the first story was – the one where they actually move in together – I decided to jump ahead a few months and find out how their first major holiday went, assuming they were still happily ensconced together. Who knew I'd still be writing about them six months later as part of a two-year project._

_I've made a few changes to the original so it will fit within the larger _Roommates_ story, so if you've read the original, bonus points for noting the differences. Please also remember that the characters have been aged up a bit, making them recent University graduates embarking on their new careers in Paris. -ep_

* * *

A few days prior to Christmas found me bustling through the shops trying to find the perfect gift for Marinette. I didn't normally wait until the last minute, but it had been an amazing season for me as a model, and with my nightly obligations as Chat, there hadn't been a ton of excess time left over that I hadn't spent with Marinette herself. We'd been together in the apartment now for close to six months – well, technically, Chat and Marinette had been together – and it felt like the right time for a gift that would tell her how much it had meant to me that she'd taken the leap of faith.

So far, though, nothing had stood out. But truly I wasn't entirely sure what I was looking for, either. And, to be honest, the lingering aftereffects from the pheromones in Marinette's gag Christmas gift had left me unable to think clearly when it came to my girlfriend, though I'd be hard pressed to explain how that was different than on any other day.

It was getting late, and snow had started to gently fall. I wrapped the scarf Marinette had knitted for me years earlier a little tighter around my overcoat and sloshed down the sidewalk, ignoring the furtive glances as people recognized me. I smiled – I couldn't blame them. I seemed to be pasted everywhere, from billboards to placards. For me it was second nature now – and further proof that our holiday campaign had gained traction. I'd yet to hear how Father had taken the news that House of Gabriel had issued bonuses to everyone for the first time in a decade.

I rounded a corner and nearly took out Marinette. She'd been coming out of the corner store with multiple bags hanging from her hands. "Mari?" I said. "I'm sorry, I didn't see you there."

"Adrien!" she greeted me warmly with a friendly hug and a quick peck to the cheek. "How are you? You never call!" she accused.

I smiled. _I see you every day, Princess,_ I thought. "Work's been a killer," I said, inclining my head toward a billboard with my smiling visage on it. "And I'm terrible at staying in touch. How are you doing? I heard your designs were accepted into the Spring Fashion Show! Congrats!"

Her eyes widened. "How did you hear about _that_?" she asked. "I only just got the letter yesterday."

_Oops! _

She'd been whooping around the apartment when I'd returned from patrol with Ladybug last night. "I have sources," I said quickly, then added: "Who have you contracted with for the runway?"

"No one yet," she laughed. "Why? Interested?"

I thought about that. As Chat, I knew Chateau Le Blanc was still small enough that they wouldn't be able to afford someone like me. On the other hand, it would give her a sizable boost in the market if I showed up on the runway for them – and, given the nascent partnership I'd forged, might benefit both of our firms. I fished out my wallet and pulled out the card for my agency. "Call Montserrat," I said. "Tell her I've already accepted – for scale."

Marinette's eyes bugged out. She knew exactly what I meant. "Are you sure?" she said, her eyes unintentionally travelling to the billboard again.

"Think of it as the Friends and Family Discount," I laughed. "Throw in some of your Belgian Chocolate-filled croissants and I'll day two for free."

Her jaw dropped. "Surely you're not serious," she said.

I leaned down and kissed her on the cheek, pausing at her ear. "I am serious," I said. "And don't call me Shirley."

Mari smacked me in the arm. "Still a geek," she laughed.

"Guilty as charged." I peered at her bags. "Ah," I said knowingly. "Shopping for your special someone now."

She blushed slightly. "Yeah," she said. "Special feline, I suppose. We've been together for… well, quite a while."

I hugged her, trying not to look into the bags _too _hard. "Good for you. Like I told you earlier, Chat's a good fit for you."

Marinette blushed. "That's kind of you to say," she smiled. "Do you still see him? From time to time?"

_More than you know._ "Every now and then," I replied instead.

"I should go," she said, glancing at her phone.

"Yeah, I'm late too," I lied. "Great to see you again, Mari."

"Same, Adrien." She looked at me for a moment longer. "Do call, won't you?"

"I will." I smiled my world-famous smile. "And I'll see you in April – if not sooner."

"Deal."

We parted company and I headed down the street; when I found the first alleyway that was empty, I ducked in. Plagg floated out of my jacket pocket where he'd been keeping warm in what was left of a mitten Marinette had given Chat some time ago. "I am impressed at how long you've managed to keep this charade going, Adrien."

"It's not easy, but I love her, which makes it worth it."

"Love," he said, "is an aged piece of Camembert."

"Love can be many things," I laughed, "and I'm sure cheese is one of them. But I need help! What should I get her? I didn't get much of a peek into those bags of hers, either."

"Cheese?" he offered. "That usually works for me."

"Not helpful."

"Don't over think, Adrien. Do what your heart tells you."

"_That_ is helpful," I said. "Let's get home and see if we can sneak a peek."

I transformed and climbed into the sky, sailing over the rooftops of Paris to our apartment, feeling somewhat serene as the snowflakes quietly but swiftly passed me as I moved. If I squinted just right, I could almost make believe I was travelling at warp speed. My balcony faced away from the Tower, and I gently dropped to the tile. Sliding the door open to my room, I could hear Marinette was already in the main space.

"Princess?" I called out. "Is it safe to come out? I hear tissue paper!"

"Chat!" she cried. "Stay put for a moment."

My feline ears heard her hurriedly replacing items in bags and hustling them to her room. Her door clicked shut, followed by: "Okay, it's safe."

I opened my door and peered around the corner, masked green eyes narrowing. "You know cats are curious, right?"

"Yes," she said.

"And that it's like catnip hearing tissue paper, right?"

"Yep."

"You have been warned," I said as I leapt from the door to her side in a swift move, planting a kiss on her lips.

"No peeking," she said, laughing. "And no unauthorized expeditions."

"I would nev—"

"You _totally_ would." She poked me in the chest. "Remember when I caught you trying to listen on my conversation with Maman?"

"Occupational hazard," I said, using a claw to point to my feline ears. "Besides, once I heard the magic word—"

"Since when is 'croissant' a magic word?"

"When it's used in the same sentence as 'Chat really likes…'"

She smacked me again. "Promise me! No snooping."

I held up my paw. "On my honor as a Miraculous Holder, no snooping."

"Good." She looked behind me. "Did you have your tail crossed?"

"No, Princess," I laughed. "That would have been a bit painful, to say the least."

A takeout bag was still on the counter, and my feline nose couldn't help but detect chicken curry from our favorite restaurant. "I thought it was my turn tonight," I said.

"My treat," she replied as she pulled containers out. "I ran into an old friend tonight, and he really made my day." She handed me a tin. "My year, actually."

"That's fantastic!" I said. I held up the glass of wine I'd poured. "To your friend."

She raised her glass. "To Adrien."

The following morning, I was a day closer to Christmas and no further ahead with my gift search. I wound up back on the streets late that evening after a full day of work and several hours on patrol with Ladybug. I'd debated asking Ladybug her thoughts but decided I didn't really want to bring up Marinette with her. I hadn't exactly asked her permission with respect to my living arrangements, although she'd taken it better than I expected when I finally fessed up.

I rounded a corner, but this time, instead of colliding with Marinette, I saw her in the distance looking through the window of a sporting goods shop. Somewhat cat-like, I pressed myself into a darker corner of the walkway and disappeared into the crowd. "Plagg," I whispered, "can you do reconnaissance?"

"No," came a small voice.

"Fine," I said. Looking around, I slid sideways into an alleyway and transformed.

I climbed up the side of the building and once on the roof, I leapt across the avenue and landed on a building that had a good view of the store Marinette was still in front of. With my better feline-enhanced vision, I could clearly see she was looking at the display of cold weather sporting goods, including a classic set of while figure skates.

That brought me back. It had been years since we'd been to the ice rink that had spawned an akuma; as far as I knew, it was still thriving, thanks to my testimonial ads for the rink owner. We'd both been there with different partners at the time, though – I'd taken Kagami, and she'd been there with Luka. I'd gotten a Christmas Card from the two of them this year, showing their new baby. Some parings were just meant to be.

But I wondered. Maybe this was what I'd been searching for.

Christmas day found me sitting on the coffee table, tail twitching, watching the lights on the Tower and idly wondering if Marinette would let me climb into the tree we'd put up. I was finding that more and more cat idiosyncrasies were appearing in my thoughts the longer I stayed in character as Chat. Climbing trees apparently was one of them.

I tilted my head in the direction of the Agreste mansion. Father would be there, alone, just as he preferred it. He only knew that I lived somewhere in the city and dropped by from time to time as needed; we had long since ceased to celebrate any holidays together. Or any other special dates. In my six months with Marinette, I had felt more love and appreciation than the years I'd spent with him.

A feline ear picked up Marinette moving in her bedroom. A moment later, her door opened and she appeared, padding out into the living space in a pair of cat-themed slippers. I raised a masked eyebrow. "Seriously?"

She yawned, her hair up in an informal bun, a few stray strands framing her beautiful face. "They were on sale. And I'm still in the 'struggling' part of my career."

She eschewed the couch and sidled up next to me on the coffee table. I wrapped an arm around her and leaned my head into her shoulder. "Merry Christmas, Princess," I said quietly.

"Merry, merry Christmas," she said, equally softly.

"Okay," I said brightly. "Time for presents!"

She looked at me. "What are you, like, thirteen?"

"Not anymore," I said proudly. "Although I feel closer to thirteen when in costume than any other time."

Something flickered across her face, but she continued to smile. "Doofus," she said fondly.

I rolled off the coffee table and grabbed two items from beneath the tree. I handed her the smaller one first. "Open," I commanded.

Carefully, Marinette pulled the paper away from the small box, and then gently flipped it open. Her eyes widened as she pulled out the small silver ring. She turned it in the light, and her eyes widened larger as the green garnet gemstones caught and reflected. "Chat…" she breathed.

"Put it on, Princess."

She slid the ring on, and held it so I could see the entire miniature paw print, comprised entirely of green garnet stones. It had been a challenge explaining the design to the jeweler as Adrien; I'd been tempted several times to transform and show her the original it was based on. Fortunately it hadn't come to that.

"This is stunning," she said. "Thank you."

"I wanted you to have a little piece of me with you all the time," I said. "I figured big, black and day-glow green might not work best for you, so I came up with this instead."

She leaned forward and kissed me. "It's adorable and I'll wear it always."

"Clawsome." I pushed the bigger box toward her. "Open."

She laughed. "What's the rush?"

"You'll see in a moment," I said. "Open!" I said again, and I leaned down into an expectant position, tail twitching.

"Incorrigible," she said. Slowly she peeled away the paper and revealed the pair of figure skates she'd been looking at. She looked back at me. "Chat…?"

"Look inside the boot."

She opened the box and pulled out one of the boots, reached in and pulled out a card. Looking at me quizzically, she slit the card open and read it aloud. "Roses are pink, violets are blue," she started, raising an eyebrow, "I've rented the rink just for you."

I smiled. "But we have to go, like, now."

"I don't understand-"

"Go change," I encouraged. "I'll wait."

Less than fifteen minutes later, I gently lowered us helicopter style outside the ice rink. I'd arranged with the owner to have it open at this ungodly hour, and he was waiting for us at the door.

"Chat Noir," he smiled. "It's ready as you requested. The door will be locked behind you."

"Thank you," I said. "Enjoy Christmas with your family, Monsieur."

He held the door open and we entered. Most of the lights were off, save for the ones that illuminated the rink; holding Marinette's hand, I walked down the main aisle and led her to the bench just to the side of the rink.

A massive Christmas tree was in the exact center, perfectly decorated for the season and fully lit. That was part of the normal holiday atmosphere of the rink; what wasn't was the multiple pounds of rose petals I'd ordered and had scattered around the ice. Softly playing over the speakers was the immortal jazz soundtrack from _A_ _Charlie Brown Christmas_, setting a wonderfully romantic mood.

"This is gorgeous," Marinette said. "But I still don't understand why we are here."

"Hold that thought," I said, "and put on your skates. I need to change into something more appropriate."

"All right," she said, skeptical expression on her face.

I leapt over the railing and trotted down the darkened hallway toward the changing rooms. Once I was far enough away from Marinette, I stopped and dropped my transformation. Plagg floated close to me as I fished out my tin of transformation cheeses. "I remind you again how much I detest these transformations," he said, frowning as I pulled out the blue wedge.

"I know, my little friend, but it's the holiday." I held it out to him. "Besides, there is a massive wheel of Camembert in our bedroom for you."

"You… you got me a gift, too?" His little green eyes went wide.

"Yes," I said. "Merry Christmas, buddy."

He looked like he was on the verge of hugging me, but thought better of it, and instead downed the cheese.

I retransformed; with the help of the special cheese, my costume adjusted into Ice Mode, sporting snowflake accents and a pair of ice skates instead of my usual boots. I quickly trotted back to the ice and found Marinette waiting for me at the entrance.

"Nice," she said. "I like your hair, too."

"My hair?"

"It's a bit whiter," she said. "It matches your costume."

"Thanks, I think." I held out a paw and helped her onto the ice. We started a gentle circle around the tree.

"I've not been here in years," Marinette said as we moved.

"Oh?" I said, knowing full well the last time she had been here. "Well I'm glad I got you to come with me." I swiveled around and skated backwards in front of her, still holding her as if we were ballroom dancing. "I needed a special place to explain to you how much knowing you – how much loving you – has meant to me over the years."

"Why an ice rink?" she said.

I pivoted her around me in a slow move. "It's a metaphor," I said simply. "On the face of it, skating looks easy, when it's anything but. The surface is tantalizingly smooth, but it covers tiny cracks that can become wide gaps with little effort."

I lifted her up and twirled her over me, putting her down at my side. "And like most things, it is best tackled with a partner who will be there to support you when you crash and need to haul yourself back up, all black and blue, and try once more to be perfect."

I pulled her around and into a hug. "Skating also represents fear; you can easily speed up and rush away from danger, leaving it all behind. But again, with a true partner, you have no need to run; instead, you can turn and face fear, together."

I pivoted her again, noting it was our third loop of the rink. "You are that partner for me, Princess. You pull me back up when I fall, you help me face my fears and keep moving forward. You support me in everything. I have no idea how I can ever, ever return the favor." I leaned down and kissed her as we slowly rotated together. "But I am going to try my best, every day, to do it."

I spun her out and she stopped a few meters ahead of me. "Your love means everything to me. I just needed a cool way to show you why."

Marinette was holding her hands to her face, her eyes glistening. "Chat…" she said. "You were doing so well until the pun…"

I laughed. "Sorry. But it was genuine."

"I know," she laughed as she skated to me and hugged me again. "And, I won't be as eloquent as you, but suffice it to say I feel the same way."

"So now you know why the rink."

"Yes," she said. "And I will never forget it, either." She paused. "Merry Christmas, Chat."

I buried my head in her hair, feeling as though the world was finally purrfect. "Merry Christmas, Princess."


	27. Off Kilter

**Twenty-Seven: Off Kilter**

_Author's Note: Chat's carefully planned New Year's with Marinette doesn't quite go as intended... in any way, shape or form._

* * *

I was as angry and frustrated as I'd ever been as I perched atop the Metro station sign directly opposite the Agreste Mansion. My full day plan for New Year's Eve had been obliterated, first with Marinette being called in at the last minute to help with preparations for costumes Chateau Le Blanc had provided for the French National Parade taking place tomorrow. I'd seen her for all of five minutes over coffee; I was pulling my breakfast quiche out of the oven when she got the call. It was unlikely I'd see her before lunch the next day – if then.

Then the first of two ill-timed akumas had appeared and wreaked major havoc on Paris, this one destroying nearly every major landmark the city offered before we were finally able to stop it. Less than an hour later, I met up with Ladybug again at the main rail station, for the second akuma of the day seemed to enjoy feeding off the iron rails (and thus disrupting travel plans for hundreds of thousands of Parisians). In a multi-hour affair that forced both of us to recharge more than once, we finally restored the transit hub in time for the mid-afternoon holiday crush.

Ladybug had seemed distracted through both and had not lingered beyond a quick "pound it" before bugging out each time. I'd returned to the apartment and had just finished cancelling the last of my plans when my baton rang. Already in a foul mood, it didn't improve when I saw it was my Father; since I spent so much time as Chat these days, I'd forwarded my civilian phone to the Cat Phone.

Frowning, for it never bode well for me when he called, I thumbed the audio-only mode before answering. "Father," I said, pitching my Chat voice slightly to sound more like Adrien.

"Adrien," I heard. "Is there something wrong with your phone? I'm not getting any video."

"Bad coverage," I replied. "What can I do for you?"

"Dinner this evening," he said curtly. "I'll expect you at nineteen-hundred."

"I have plans," I said icily, despite most of them being toasted.

"Cancel them," he replied and then hung up.

I stared at my baton, feeling like steam was coming out of my feline ears.

* * *

Twenty minutes before my designed arrival found me perched on the classic Metro sign, tail twisting angrily; my mood had not improved in the least, presaging a dinner that would require every ounce of my model training to prevent a nuclear war. Our relationship had been tolerable while my mother had been around; after her disappearance, he'd become remote, and in my teenage brain, something of a totalitarian. He'd never blessed my attending public school, had fought me going to Lycée, and had tried to freeze my funds for University. I'd managed to outfox him each time, but it had only added to the distance between us.

Having moved out of the mansion for University, I'd rarely visited since; unfortunately, we did have to interact in order to run House of Gabriel, though even those meetings had been kept to a minimum – and had always been at our corporate offices. Father knew I resisted returning to our family home, and though he didn't respect many things in my life, it was one area that he'd accepted. The fact he'd summonsed me on the eve of a major holiday was meant as a message, of course, and I took it as such.

My feline ears pivoted, and I groaned; a moment later, I heard the _zing_ of Ladybug's yo-yo. Wondering how much worse this evening could get, I turned to watch her land next to me. "Kitty," she smiled. "What's up?"

"I didn't expect to see you again this evening, Milady," I smiled back, feeling a bit of my gloom evaporate in her presence. I cocked my head and narrowed my eyes. "Are you following me?"

"Always," she laughed as she scooted to sit next to me. "Honestly? I managed to sneak home after a very, very long day for my civilian persona; I'd hoped to surprise my boyfriend with dinner before having to get back to the office, but he wasn't home." She looked at me for a moment. "I admit I was at loose ends and wanted company. I hope I'm not intruding."

I smiled; I'd known for a bit now that Ladybug had someone in her life, too. "I'm sorry to hear that," I said truthfully. "And I'm always happy to have you by my side. I sort of have the same problem. Marinette had to work today so I wound up cancelling all of my secret plans."

Ladybug's eyes widened. "I'm sorry, too. Those akumas didn't help my schedule today, either," she continued. "The glamorous life of a superhero."

"Fur sure," I punned.

She looked over toward the mansion. "Strange place for you to be spending New Year's Eve, though, Chat."

Deliberately misunderstanding, I replied: "Atop a Metro station?"

"No, silly kitty, here at Agreste Manor."

I looked up as if it was the first time I'd noticed it. "Ah," I said. "So it is." I looked back at her. "I've not been here in a while; Adrien has long since moved out."

"Same here," she said, "and I don't visit Adrien like you do, so I don't actually know where he lives now."

_Closer than you think_, I thought to myself. "It's partly why I'm here," I said, suddenly realizing how I could use her appearance to my advantage. "He's been summonsed to speak with the old man tonight."

"And you're doing what, exactly?"

"Keeping watch." I yawned, widely. "Lending him an ear afterward. But to be honest, I'm kinda toast."

Ladybug put a hand to my arm. "Let me take it from here, then," she said. "Go home and get some rest."

"Are you sure?" I asked.

"Yeah," she smiled. "I don't have to be back to my 'day' job until a little after midnight."

I narrowed my eyes. "That's a bit of an oxymoron."

She smiled. "It is. Go."

I leaned in and gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. "I owe you," I smiled.

"And I'll collect," she laughed as I leapt away.

I worked my way a few streets from the mansion, circled, and de-transformed so I'd approach as Adrien from the opposite direction. My hope was that Ladybug would resist checking the tracker since I was ostensibly heading home; as I rounded the corner to the mansion, I saw she was still atop the Metro station and waved to her.

Using her yo-yo, she dropped next to me on the sidewalk. "Adrien," she smiled.

"You're not Chat," I smiled back.

"No," she laughed. "He was here, but I sent him home."

"Look," I said, "I feel bad about asking Chat to hang out – worse now that _the_ Hero of Paris is here."

"It's not a problem," she said. "I could use an easy assignment, given the kind of day it's been."

I arched an eyebrow. "You underestimate my father," I said.

"Maybe." She pointed to the Metro. "I'll be over there when you get done."

"Ladybug-"

She leaned up and gently brushed a kiss to my cheek. "We're both here for you, Adrien," she said. "See you in a bit."

* * *

Nathalie closed the door to the dining room behind me, leaving me alone in the empty space. The long table had been set for two – one spot at either end, just as always. Smiling at the irony, I went to the buffet and poured myself a glass of wine, then piled my plate with a little of everything on offer. I might not have enjoyed the company, but the food had always been excellent – what little had been provided to me, for growing up as a model, my calories had been strictly supervised.

As had everything else.

Settling into my usual position, I slipped Plagg a slice of Camembert just for old times' sake and then decided to throw my manners to the wind and not wait, tucking into my meal with abandon. I'd been busy enough that I'd actually not stopped to refuel myself. I also knew that Father preferred a dramatic entrance, one that was generally delayed to heighten my anxiety. It had been a long, long time since he'd had that effect on me, though.

I was just polishing off a slice of strawberry-rhubarb pie when, some forty-five minutes later, Father burst through the far doors. "My apologies," he said as he moved directly to his chair without looking at me. "I hope you didn't wait."

"I didn't," I replied as I dabbed my napkin to my face and then stood to retrieve a cup of coffee. "You look pale, Father," I added with a trace of snark. "You should come to the office more."

"I'll take that under advisement." He wrapped his long fingers around his already-filled wineglass.

"What did you want to talk about?" I asked as I sipped my coffee and leaned against the banquet.

"Can't a father simply have dinner with his son?" he countered.

I sighed. "Look, I'm tired and more than a little cranky this evening," I said.

"I know," he replied with that odd enigmatic smile I'd seen from him over the years. It was one that always put me on high alert, as it did once more that evening.

"Do you?" I said, smiling my broad model smile. "That would be a first," I added quietly, pushing in the dagger just a bit.

His eyebrows went up and he nodded appreciatively. The battle had been joined. "I've always cared about you, Adrien."

I raised my own eyebrows. "You have a funny way of showing it." I sipped again. "As much as I am enjoying our witty banter," I added before he had a chance to counter me, "I really do have plans this evening."

"So, you are seeing someone, then," he observed.

"That is none of your business."

"Is it that Dupain-Cheng woman? From Chateau Le Blanc?" He sipped his wine again. "That would literally be sleeping with the enemy."

"I shouldn't be shocked that you think so little of my virtue." Keeping my face impassive, I stared at him coldly. "I've known Marinette for years, Father," I answered, wondering why he was attempting to rile me up. "She is an old friend. And a brilliant designer – something we used to look for at House of Gabriel, I might add."

"We have an image," he said. "If it were to get out that you were seeing her, romantically, what would that do for our stock price?"

"I guess we'll never know," I smiled, but it held no trace of humor. "And we call it 'dating' now, Father. Something I am definitely not doing." I paused for a moment, let it stretch to two, then added: "With anyone."

Father looked at me and then down to the leather portfolio he'd carried in. With a quick movement, he tossed three eight-by-ten photos at me, which I caught as they slid down the table. "These say otherwise."

I examined them and tried to keep my anger and shock from being visible, for Father had clearly been keeping very close tabs on me. Two of the photos were of me and Marinette having lunch months ago in the atrium of her company's headquarters; the third was the two of us, not more than a week ago, during our chance encounter while shopping for Christmas. I looked up. "I worry about your math skills, Father," I said, working overtime to keep the anger from my voice. "These don't add up to anything."

"I have more," he said quietly.

That prompted an arched eyebrow. "Seriously? Of what, exactly? Us having coffee together?" I tossed the photos back at him. "I don't understand the point you're trying to make here."

"You are too close to our business partner."

I rolled my eyes. "You clearly don't read the Ladyblog, do you?" I asked.

"No," he said just a little too quickly.

"Ah," I said as I put my coffee down. "Well, if you did, you would know what the rest of Paris knows."

Something shifted in his eyes, and what I saw suddenly worried me. "So, it's true, then," he said triumphantly.

I realized he'd played me masterfully into confirming something for him and cursed internally. "Why is that important for you to know?" I demanded.

"It's a pressure point," he smiled as he sat back. "One that... House of Gabriel... can use to control her. Control Chateau Le Blanc."

My blood ran cold, for his very attitude made it feel far more important – and more dangerous, both for Marinette and, potentially, Chat. I'm not sure why, but it occurred to me that it was somewhat helpful to have discovered the seeds of whatever Machiavellian plot Father was cooking up.

Unfortunately for him, he'd just tipped off the feline superhero. I gave him a dangerous Chat smile that he misread as acceptance of what he'd said. "Control her? What exactly are you talking about?"

He smiled again, like he had found a missing piece of a puzzle that had long frustrated him. "I'm talking about winning, about finally getting what we want." He pushed back from his chair. "It was pleasant seeing you Adrien. Good night."

As he started to leave, I called after him rather sarcastically, "Happy New Year, Father."

He paused at the door. "It will be, indeed," he nodded, and vanished.

* * *

Ladybug was right where I left her when I exited the tall wrought iron gates to the mansion. I must have been giving off massive sympathetic vibrations for she was at my side within moments. "That good, eh?" she asked.

"And then some."

She looked at me and before I realized what she was about, Ladybug wrapped an arm around me and tossed her yo-yo into the air.

"Ladybug-!" I started.

"I'm going to cheer you up," she said.

"As much as I appreciate the sentiment," I said, "I'd rather just go home and have another glass of wine."

"This is far better," she said and tightened her grip around me.

I sighed. In my "helpless" state as Adrien, I wasn't about to change her mind so I settled in for the ride. Normally I was the one to carry people, so it was a bit odd being ferried. Not that I didn't mind being close to Ladybug.

Some feelings never go away, really.

At length, Ladybug landed on a familiar rooftop that had a magnificent view of the Eiffel Tower. So good, in fact, that it was where _I'd_ originally planned on bringing Marinette to watch the fireworks at midnight. "This is a favorite of mine," she said as we sat down on the slanted tile facing the lit tower. "Best seat in the house, in fact."

"Is it that late?" I asked, wondering a bit about the odds that Ladybug would like this particular spot, too.

"Nearly," she said. "You were in there a long time."

"I'm sorry," I said. "You really didn't have to wait."

"I know."

We sat companionably for a bit, though without my super suit, I was a bit underdressed for the chilly evening. Ladybug noticed my shivering. "You're freezing!" she said and sidled a bit closer.

"A little," I smiled. "I normally dress better when I expect to be out at night," I said truthfully.

Without saying a word, she scooted even closer and wrapped an arm around me, pulling me into her costumed torso. I automatically ducked a bit to fit into her better, allowing her to lean her head against mine. It was a move I did regularly with Marinette, though again, it was weird being on the receiving end.

"I can keep you warm for a bit," she said, turning to put her chin on my shoulder. "But If you get too cold, I'll take you home."

I nodded for that was about all I could manage. Ladybug had never been this intimately close to me – in either guise – and I was struggling with emotions I didn't realize I still had. As the tower began to glow with the start of the New Year's celebration, I reminded myself that I was already committed to Marinette; my feelings for Ladybug, while still strong, were not of the same order.

Or were they? Try as I might, I was having trouble focusing on the fireworks; my slightly enhanced sense of smell picked up the most obvious notes that were Ladybug, and I could hear her breathing softly beside me. Maybe it was the wine I'd had with dinner, but for some reason, it felt so purrfectly correct to be cozily pressed into her that I closed my eyes and savored the moment.

As I heard the fireworks reach their finale crescendo, Ladybug gently pressed her lips to mine. For a moment, I found myself leaning into it, hungrily devouring their softness before my guilty heart reminded me _who_ I was currently kissing.

My eyes snapped open. "Mila-Ladybug," I said as I quickly pulled away and put a bit of distance between us. I knew my face was on fire with embarrassment. "I'm... flattered, but..."

She sat back herself, and I could see a bit of a blush forming. "I'm sorry," she said. "I think the moment carried me away there."

"It's New Years," I said, trying to lighten the moment. "Look, I should get home."

"Yeah, me too." She stood up. "Where can I drop you?"

* * *

I landed on my balcony railing at the apartment a bit after three, having prowled Paris since Ladybug left me back at the mansion. I was ashamed, angry and embarrassed, and had no idea how I was going to face Marinette. As long as we'd been together, not once had I even _looked_ at another woman; the fact my transgression had been Ladybug seemed to make everything worse.

I knew it was only a kiss, but I also realized it could have gone far further; I'd seen the look in Ladybug's eyes, something I had long dreamed of as Chat. What made me even angrier was that, if I were truly being honest with myself... I'd enjoyed the kiss. Immensely.

And that worried me for what it implied.

Slipping off the wrought iron, I stepped to the wall and slowly started to bang my feline head against it, tail twisting with angst. I knew I loved Marinette – there was no doubt in my heart of hearts about that. But the evening's activities had uncorked something I thought I'd packed away; I paused mid-head-bang to remind myself that Ladybug had kissed _Adrien_, not Chat, before banging it slightly harder at the insanity of the situation.

I was torn on what to tell Marinette about the evening – and not just about the kiss with Ladybug.

Sighing, I slid the door open to my bedroom, then snuck to the door to the main space. I couldn't hear anything, and cracking the door open slightly, my feline night vision confirmed the space was clear. I crept far enough out into the main space so I could strain my feline hearing enough to determine if Marinette had returned from work, but her bedroom was quiet.

As I skulked back to my bedroom, I decided that maybe it was a blessing that she was putting in overtime, for it would give me a few more hours to figure out just what I was going to say to her. Leaping onto my bed, I laced my claws behind my mane and stayed transformed, for I knew I wasn't going to be getting any sleep.


	28. (In)Corrective Actions

**Twenty-Eight: (In)Corrective Action**

_Author's Note: Plagued by his late-night New Year's Eve forbidden kiss, Chat finds no easy answers for dealing with the sudden resurgence of his long-buried feelings for Ladybug._

* * *

I was still awake when the first rays of sunshine began to lighten my bedroom, seamlessly transitioning my night vision to my (quasi) normal feline vision. Marinette hadn't returned to the apartment, but given she was pulling an all-nighter for the parade that morning, I wasn't overly surprised. Groaning – but no further toward a solution on how to handle my kiss with Ladybug – I rolled out of bed and did a full-body feline stretch, popping a few joints in a most satisfactory fashion.

Torn between making a cup of coffee and escaping the suffocating confines of my bedroom, I vaulted out the still-open slider and perched on my balcony railing for a brief moment before launching myself into the dazzling early morning sunshine. I might not have gotten any sleep overnight, but my feline brain knew of a few spots where I could curl up in the sun and, at least for a few hours, escape my troubles. One of the spots was a tiny nook in the façade of Dupont, and I quickly worked my way to our old school through the quiet morning.

The roof had the comfortable familiarity of an old friend that had been forgotten for too long; I dropped out of my arc into a crouch on the tile and took in the roof rimming the open courtyard where we'd spent so many hours of our young life. A few leaps and I was at the rear of the ornamental façade; one more leap and a judicious use of claws on granite and I'd hauled myself into the small oblong space that was facing the rising sun. It had been years since I'd been in that spot, and I discovered as an adult it was a little more difficult to fold myself into what had seemed like a much bigger space. However, once I'd arranged myself, I'd found the stones were already warmed up a bit; placing my chin on my paws, I closed my masked eyes and quickly, blissfully, managed to drop off into a dreamless sleep.

I tried to ignore a gentle tap at my shoulder, and mumbled a curse or two when it became more insistent. Cracking a masked eye, I found Ladybug staring at me with a half-smile, pulling back her offending hand. "Milady," I mewled, "I was sleeping."

"Yes," I heard her chuckle. "It's mid-afternoon, and there are literally hundreds of likes of your photo on the Ladyblog."

Both masked eyes snapped open. "What?"

"Alya happened to be in that building over there," Ladybug smiled wider as she pointed to a taller edifice next to the school. "You're cute when you're all curled up."

Unfolding myself from the nook, I reached for my baton and pulled up Instagram. Sure enough, my friend had nailed me from almost the right height; in truth, I did look rather relaxed. I looked back up. "Me_ow_," I smiled. "What a hunk."

Ladybug rolled her eyes. "Anyway, I thought I should roust you in case Hawkmoth reads the Ladyblog." She paused. "You're a little old to be catnapping like this, aren't you?"

"I suppose," I said, "but I didn't sleep well last night."

"Oh?" she asked.

"Yeah," I replied and shifted my gaze.

"Why?" she smiled. "Feeling guilty about something, are we?"

My head snapped back to her. "Sorry?" I said, unable to keep the shock of discovery off my face.

"It's okay, Chat," she laughed. "You wear your emotions on your sleeve. Clearly you've done something that's troubling your soul. You can tell me; in fact, it might help you feel better."

I thought about that, and for once, I knew she was wrong. How could I tell her I was feeling guilty about kissing her? Especially since _Chat_ hadn't been the one kissing her. My tail twitched at the insanity of the situation; as my silence stretched into a full minute, Ladybug's smile shifted to a look of concern.

"Oh my God, Chat. What _did_ you do?"

Turning away, I started to pace, my tail swishing as I walked. "It's... complicated."

Ladybug intercepted me when I turned, and put a hand to my shoulder. "Take a deep breath," she said quietly, "and then explain it."

I sighed. "I... feel like I've done something wrong. And I don't know how to correct it."

Ladybug nodded. "Go on."

I looked at her, and the concern in her eyes; despite myself, I found a Chat smile appearing. "Just so you know, I didn't kill anyone."

"For the love of kwami-"

"Sorry." I started to pace like a caged feline again, shrugging out from beneath her hand; even now, I could feel my face warming in confused embarrassment, for there was no question I had experienced a momentary thrill at her touch. At once, my emotions were thrown back into turmoil once more. "You know I love Marinette, right?" I said.

"Yes," she replied immediately. "And I couldn't be happier for you." She paused. "For both of you."

I stopped at the waist-high stone filigree rimming one side of the building's roof, and put my paws down along the smooth top, leaning over them and letting my out of control mane fall forward over my mask. Oddly, it occurred to me I'd not changed my hairstyle as Chat after all these years. "You're in love with someone, too, aren't you?" I asked quietly.

Ladybug stepped next to me and leaned against the railing. "Yes," she said softly, confirming something that I had long suspected.

"It's not the original guy you had a thing for all those years ago, is it?"

"No," she nodded. "But I'd be lying if I said I didn't still feel something for him."

I shifted slightly; a bang covered one of my masked eyes as I looked at her sidelong. "That first love is hard to get over, isn't it?"

She sighed. "I'm not sure you ever do, really." She looked out across the city. "I tend to run into my former crush rather regularly. It might be easier to get over if I'd left Paris, I suppose, but I couldn't do that." Ladybug turned back to me and waved a gloved hand at her costume. "For obvious reasons."

I smiled at her. "I'm hurt. I thought I was the reason you've never left Paris."

Ladybug smiled back. "It might be a part of the reason." She leaned forward and tapped my bell. "A _small _part."

"Now I _am_ hurt," I said good naturedly.

"You'll get over it." She considered me for a bit. "I know how you once felt about me, Chat," she continued softly. "And much like me, it's probably not been easy to see your crush every day and still have that echo of what you felt-"

"Feel, Milady," I interrupted. "That's the nugget right there, I guess." I looked back out across the late afternoon sunshine-dappled streets of the city I loved. "Recently, I've been reminded that those... feelings I'd come to terms with and packed away – feelings I've had since the beginning, I might add – are not as buried as I thought."

"Chat," she said carefully. "I hope I've not inadvertently done something. I mean, you'll always have a part of my heart, obviously, but not like – not like my boyfriend. If that makes sense."

I looked back. "Sort of," I replied, knowing I couldn't even begin to explain the effect of that one kiss last night. "And if I were being honest, the same is true for me." At a loss for what else to say, I went for physical action and leapt up to perch on the stone wall; I turned, allowing my tail to swing freely out over the street below. "I guess what it comes down to is this immense feeling of guilt. I know I love Marinette without reservation; but even having these thoughts about you... and me..."

I felt my face start to warm, as if I were a teenager once more and not a twentysomething fashion industry mogul who also happened to be a feline-themed superhero. It would have been comical if it hadn't felt so deadly serious to me. Looking helplessly at Ladybug, I said very, very quietly: "I don't want to hurt her. If she ever found out – I can't even imagine how she'd feel. And I can't lose her." I paused again. "Or you."

That was when she surprised me.

Stepping forward, she reached up and pulled my head down to hers, leaning her forehead into mine. "I'm in the same boat, Chat. And you know what? I think we're going to be okay. Both of us."

"But-"

"Marinette knows about me, right?" she asked quietly. She was so close to me, her exquisitely unique scent was filling my feline senses and, I had to admit, was more than a little bit distracting. I had to focus to hear the second part of her question. "How you felt about me? Before the two of you got together?"

"Yes," I said, managing to command my voice to work. Much like the prior evening, her proximity was triggering all sorts of impulses again, though this time around, since I was transformed, they were a thousand-fold more potent. "Milady," I said, my voice low and husky but containing a note of warning. "I... I think..."

Leaning up slightly, Ladybug brushed a kiss against the exposed section of my cheek, just below the mask.

It was too much.

Before I even understood _what_ I was doing, blind feline instincts had me reaching around and pulling Ladybug in close; as I narrowed my masked eyes and breathed in her scent deeply, I gently pressed my lips to hers. I expected her to pull away; purrhaps, what little rational part of me was left _hoped _she would – and maybe even bop me on the head with her yo-yo for my impertinence. She surprised me again by doubling down, pulling me even closer and pressing her smooth lips back to mine with barely repressed fervency.

I slipped off the stones and the two of us slid further down the half-wall. The force and intensity of her desire – of mine, too, for that matter – surprised me; a shrinking portion of my fur brain screamed that I needed to get away, get some fresh air and hope some sense re-appeared. My heart, though, was in the driver's seat, aided and abetted by overwhelming feline impulses; the two of us progressed as far as was possible short of dropping our transformations right up until the setting sun cast a rosy red glow across the rooftop.

Coming finally to my senses, I found myself half-leaning with my head against the cold stone of the wall, with Ladybug lying on top of me. She had her head on my chest and was tracing little circles around one of the metal accents of my costume, the two of us breathing as though we'd run a half-marathon. Purrhaps we had, given how long our apparent emotions had been pent up. I reached down and stroked a pigtail with a claw and she turned up toward me.

"What did we just do?" I asked, feeling as though I'd actually committed a major crime.

"Something we should have done a long time ago, I think," Ladybug replied with a warm smile.

"Ladybug," I said softly, feeling the weight bearing down on me. "I'm - _we're_ both in a relationship with someone else. This—this-"

"Had to happen," Ladybug said as she put a hand to the edge of my mask. "Now it has."

My face had to have been a dark, dark shade of crimson. "I shouldn't have-"

"You're adorable when you're flustered," Ladybug laughed.

I felt like my face had gone even darker. "What am I gonna say? What are _you_ gonna say? How-"

"Chat, stop," she said softly. "No one is going to say _anything_."

I swallowed. "I _have_ tell Marinette," I said, my masked eyes wide. "This is... huge. I've-"

"You're not going to tell her anything," she said firmly. "And I'm not going to tell my boyfriend. This is a one-time thing. Between us."

I looked at her and saw the sincerity in her eyes. "I can't lie to her."

"You won't be."

"But-" I started before I caught a glint of something. Turning, I trained my feline eyes on rooftop of the building overlooking the school.

And the very recognizable brown hair of a certain blogger-slash-journalist.

I squeezed my masked eyes shut at the headache that had suddenly appeared behind them.

"What?" I heard Ladybug ask.

"I won't have to tell her," I sighed, pinching the bridge of my masked nose. "She'll be able to read all about in the Ladyblog."

Ladybug swore.

"I second that," I said, laughing ruefully.

* * *

_Special Note: Thanks for waiting - this chapter required some... tender care, which took longer than normal. -ep_


	29. Complications

**Twenty-Nine: Complications**

_Author's Note: Chat and Ladybug have a bigger problem on their hands when Alya becomes aware of their actions._

* * *

I leapt toward the building a fraction of a second behind Ladybug, who appeared to be far more upset than I was over the actions of the Ladyblogger. I was unhappy, to be sure, for in some ways my friend had invaded my purrsonal space; even allowing for the fact that Ladybug and I were such public figures, it was a boundary that Alya had not crossed before now. What troubled me more was the possibility that Marinette might learn of my actions _through_ Alya, who admittedly had a vested interest to protect her friend. I couldn't blame her, for my own guilt weighed heavily on my soul.

Alya had apparently seen our reaction to her capturing our unguarded moment and had vanished from where she'd been hovering over the edge with the phone that had caught my attention. The physical activity of hitting the side of the building, claws out, and then leaping from ledge to ledge drove all thoughts of what had happened with Ladybug to the periphery. Higher and higher I leapt, focusing on driving my claws deep into stone and trying desperately to keep up with my motivated partner.

I curled over the edge and landed in my crouch side-by-side with Ladybug, and watched with some awe as Alya transformed on the spot to Rena Rouge; it was an amazing breach of Miraculous protocol, one with ramifications that went well beyond what she had done. Nevertheless, as Rena, she proceeded to vault over the far edge of the roof and landed just out of sight on the building beyond.

"You let her _keep_ her Miraculous?" I asked incredulously as I leapt into the air to get a bit of a jump-start so I could land on serious run.

"Yeah," Ladybug said as she pulled even with me. "Carapace has his, too, now. They've been part of the team so long, I felt like I could trust them with it."

"Thanks for keeping me in the loop," I snarked.

"I would have told you," Ladybug said defensively. "But it's a recent development and we've both been a bit busy with the holidays. Besides, I hate keeping secrets from you, kitty."

"You have a funny way of showing it," I said as I leapt over the edge of the roof and landed on the building beyond. "I think we now have the answer for how she's been getting those exclusive photos of us."

Ladybug landed next to me and we dashed after Rena who was now barely twenty meters ahead but, with the enhancements the Miraculous provided, maintaining her lead. "You aren't surprised she's Rena," Ladybug observed.

"No," I said, my tail flapping behind me as I kicked into a higher gear and incrementally gained on our teammate. "She's never been able to hide her feelings around Carapace," I added as we hurdled a skylight and gained on the fox. "It's gotten worse since their marriage."

"I know, right?" Ladybug said humorlessly.

"Are you going to kick her off the team?" I asked.

"I'm debating it," she said as we gained on Rena.

"As angry as I am with Rena, the circle is pretty small; It's just us," I reminded her. "Even assuming Carapace knows, the fact that you've given them their Miraculous means they are perfectly capable of defending each other. And I hasten to add she's not the _only _one making creative use of their time as a superhero."

"I highly doubt she's hanging around the house as Rena with Nino," Ladybug said as we hopped over another alleyway and climbed the side of third building. Rena had slowed as a result of her difficulty climbing and was now within shouting distance.

"Rena!" I yelled, allowing a little of my anger into my voice. "This is madness! We know where you live."

The fox's bushy tail slipped over the edge of the roof without comment.

I leapt sideways to catch a ledge, then sideways again to gain height. Ladybug cheated and rose up on her yo-yo; by the time I'd made it to the roof, she was standing in front of Rena, twirling her yo-yo a bit menacingly, betraying her anger much like my tail would. Opting to let Ladybug lead, I leapt to her side but stayed in my cat crouch, cocking my head upward to see how this played out.

"Explain yourself," Ladybug said hotly.

Rena crossed her arms. "Ladybug—"

"_Explain yourself_," Ladybug demanded. It was forceful enough that my ears flattened.

"Fine," Rena said. "But you should know I've already uploaded the photos to my Instagram."

"You _what_?" I growled. "You had no—"

"I had _every_ right," she said. "I'm a journalist and it's a big scoop, seeing as though at least _one_ of you is ostensibly seeing someone."

That made me stand up. "Rena, you didn't do me any favors when you published those photos of my trip with Marinette this summer. Posting what you _think_ Ladybug and I were doing on that roof—"

"Think?" Rena laughed mirthlessly. "You _claim_ to be in love with my best friend, Chat," she said, her eyes flashing as she whirled on Ladybug. "And you! Miss all-high-and-mighty making a move on Chat like that. So much for your superior moral ground."

"Making—!" Ladybug fairly spluttered. "I did no such—"

"The photos beg to differ," Rena said grimly before looking back at me. "Not that Chat didn't appear to be a willing participant. All this time," she said more softly as she turned back to Ladybug, "I had the two of you on some sort of hero pedestal. I can't believe what I saw – and what I might have seen if you'd managed to yank that bell zipper down."

I felt my face color a bit at the memory of Ladybug's touch at my collar and – yes – her rather urgent tugging at the bell. I thanked Plagg silently for keeping my costume intact. "Whatever happened between Ladybug and me is, frankly, between us," I said firmly, folding my arms. "And we both have to face the consequences with our significant others. Maybe you had the right to publish, maybe you didn't, but you've made a difficult situation for us far, far worse."

"This isn't on me, Chat."

"Rena," I said as I stepped toward her. "You have to know me well enough to know that my first instinct is to rush home to Marinette and spill my guts to her, no matter the consequences. I presume Ladybug feels the same," I added, glancing to my partner who was nodding. "I'd have preferred not having my girlfriend find out about this from anyone other than me."

"You should have thought about that before you kissed Ladybug, Chat," Rena said.

"This cat isn't going to cry over spilt milk," I replied. "But tell me honestly: if you had stepped out on Carapace, would you want him seeing it on social media?"

That made her pause for a number of reasons. "I'd never do that," she said after a moment.

"Before this afternoon, I would have said the same," I said. "I have no excuses," I added as I looked at my partner once more, "and, clearly, I have some unresolved issues with respect to my feelings for Ladybug. And, purrhaps, she does, too."

"Yes," Ladybug said softly as she caught my eye.

"I've already posted," Rena reminded us. "Even if I agreed to take down the photos, they're out there now."

I felt my feline ears wilt, for the one-two punch of my own actions and Rena having committed it to posterity finally hit me. Leaping into the air and helicoptering away from everything felt like a wonderful option, as marvelously unrealistic as it was. Wandering over to a pony wall, I hopped up and perched on the stone and felt very much like I was a bumbling fourteen-year-old, not a successful twentysomething who had (until recently) a loving relationship with my soulmate.

Rena paused, and for the first time my friend's righteous anger at what we had done – what I had done to her friend, rather – had been replaced with a bit of sadness. Whether it was over our actions or the crumbling of her vision of the two of us, I couldn't be exactly sure. "The damage is done."

"All right," Ladybug said quietly as she stowed her yo-yo and went to sit atop a skylight. While we'd been talking, the moon had finally come out and the sky was twinkling with stars – stars that seemed much happier than the three of us on that roof were. I could smell the first faint chill of the evening on the breeze and recognized it as the portent it was. "I don't see a choice, then. Give us a day or so to deal with our personal relationships, and then we'll do an exclusive interview with you to explain to Paris what happened."

My mane snapped toward Ladybug. "An _interview_?" I mewled, my masked feline eyes wide in shock. "You think that's going to fix anything?"

"No," Ladybug said. "But it might start to repair our reputations with Paris."

I stared at my partner. Airing my humiliation live on the internet hadn't even remotely been on my to-do list. "As you wish, Milady," I said as I turned back to Rena. "Do we have an agreement?"

Rena looked at the two of us. "Do I lose my Miraculous?"

"We're going to have a long chat about using it for personal reasons," Ladybug said. "But no."

"Good," Rena smiled. "Since Chat—"

"Don't push it," Ladybug growled. Impressively, it was close to my own.

"Okay. You'll be in touch?"

"Yes," Ladybug said.

* * *

As much as we wanted to carefully work through what happened, both Ladybug and I knew we needed to get home to our significant others and try to assess the damage we had just wreaked upon our respective relationships. The following evening was a normal patrol night for us, but we agreed to meet up an hour earlier to compare notes and decide how to proceed with Alya... as well as deal with the cross-species relationship we'd stumbled our way into.

And, to be honest, I was ready to get away from Ladybug for a while. Just _thinking_ about the rooftop brought heat to the exposed sections of my masked face.

I made my way home through the early evening, reluctant to return to my sanctuary and face Marinette. At the same time, I knew I needed to get to her before the effect of the photos had settled in for her; I was long past worrying about whether she'd seen them, knowing that, like me, she was automatically notified when the Ladyblog had a new post on Instagram. Pausing on a rooftop, I tried Marinette for the fourth time using the Cat Phone and started to worry that her not picking up the phone was a signal as to how she was taking the news.

Landing on my balcony, I slid the door to my bedroom open and carefully entered, feline ears twitching to see if my girlfriend was home. One step into my room, though, my night vision saw her sitting on my bed, cross-legged, her phone in her hands and her tablet on the comforter. I didn't need to look at the screen of either to know what was glowing there, almost mockingly.

That she was even _in_ my room was unusual, for up to that point, we'd treated each other's suites as sacrosanct – no entrance unless invited. Granted, I'd been inviting her into mine more and more frequently, but that was beside the point. I was thankful I'd not dropped my transformation as I'd landed; that would have been one additional complication I was nowhere near ready to deal with.

My heartrate ticked up as I stowed my baton. "Princess," I said carefully, my masked eyes searching hers for any indicator of how this conversation was going to go.

"Chat," she replied quietly. "We need to talk."


	30. Found

**Thirty: Found**

_Author's Note: Chat and Marinette have a long-overdue heart-to-heart._

* * *

_Special Note: Just a reminder, Chat and Marinette are age-appropriate, consenting adults in the timeline for which _Roommates_ takes place. You've been warned._

* * *

If there was ever at time that I would have found myself wishing for an akuma to suddenly appear, it was while I was standing a half meter from the love of my life, who was deliberately flipping through photos of my dalliance with Ladybug. And there were _photos_ – from what I could tell, albeit upside down, Alya had been on the roof far longer than either of us had realized, and more than one of them left very little to the imagination of what the two of us had been about. I resisted the urge to slide the baton up and fake an akuma alert, though it was far tougher not to give myself over to my feline instincts for self-preservation and bolt back through the still-open slider.

Swallowing, I tentatively took a step forward. "Princess," I said softly.

"There are _hundreds_ of these," Marinette said as she continued to swipe. "How long was she up there?"

"Longer than I realized," I replied. "Clearly, I'm not good at illicit romance," I laughed nervously. "Rooftops are apparently a bad spot."

"No kidding," she said as she looked up again. She'd pulled her hair back into the twin pigtails that had been one of many things that had endeared me to her in the first place and I choked up; while she didn't _seem_ to look hurt or betrayed, I was feeling _all_ of those on her behalf. "I'd recommend a number of other places that are more private," she continued. "Even the Eiffel Tower would be a better spot."

I already knew my face was on fire, though she was unlikely to see it given her tablet was the sole source of illumination in the room. "I'd take that under advisement, were there to be a next time," I said so quietly that I wasn't sure _I_ had heard it.

Marinette looked at me, and slowly got up from the bed. "Are you honestly telling me there won't be a next time, kitty?" she asked as she stood in front of me. "That you won't be tempted by that vixen in a skintight red-and-black-polka-dotted suit?" she continued as she tapped a finger against a pectoral.

"Is it skintight?" I squeaked as I stepped backwards. "I hadn't noticed."

"It is," she said, tapping me harder. "Much like yours."

"Princess—" I started as I took another step backwards. My baton bumped up against the fixed glass of the slider, inadvertently making me realize she'd cornered me. Marinette emphasized the point by putting a hand over my shoulder, palm on the window and close enough to my exposed cheek I could feel the warmth from it.

"Answer me, kitty," she said as she narrowed her blue eyes at me. "Can you _honestly_ say you wouldn't look twice at Ladybug?"

"No! I mean, yes—!" My breath caught, for I'd not immediately noticed where the other hand had wound up until it made itself known in an _extremely_ sensitive area. I gasped again as she made another quick pass.

"Now that I _know_ I have your attention," she said with a devious gleam to her eyes, "care to try that again?"

"Marin_ette_," I growled a bit of a warning. "This isn't—" I gasped again, and this time had to close my masked eyes to try and steady myself. Multiple competing impulses were coursing through me, confusing the issue entirely.

Wasn't I supposed to be apologizing to her? This wasn't how I expected the conversation to go. At all.

"I'm waiting, Chat," she said as she tapped my bell with her finger.

Swallowing again, I tried to put my fuzzy thoughts in order. "I love you, Marinette," I said weakly.

_Seriously, Chat? That's the best you've got? You've had pithier responses to akumas._

Her eyes darted down quickly then returned to mine. "I know," she said.

My face felt like it was radiating as if it were a supernova in progress. But I couldn't take my eyes off of her, even though I could see something dancing in those deep blue eyes. Did it emphasize how much trouble I was in, or was there some sort of wicked delight there? Her actions were making it insanely difficult to focus.

"You know how much – whoa – Ladybug means to me," I said, trying and failing to ignore how she was drawing little circles around the metal accent on my shoulder. Her touch was like fire, which was something given I was still transformed. "I… oh, _wow_…" I started to say before she managed to get on her tip-toes to nibble at a spot just above my collar.

"You, what, exactly?" she asked, and I could feel her breath against my skin as she nibbled again.

"I… uh… Mari, look," I said somewhat urgently. "If you want to get—oh, dear _kwami_!—full sentences from me…"

"Really?" she said sweetly. "Am I distracting you?"

I took a deep breath. "Most… defelinely," I breathed, squeezing my masked eyes shut again. My feline brain was starting to overload.

I felt Marinette pull back slightly. "Okay."

Taking another deep breath, I re-opened my masked eyes. "I'm sorry," I said simply. "I didn't realize how I felt about Ladybug, still," I continued. "I love you, Mari," I said emphatically. "That hasn't changed."

She looked at me. "But?"

I sighed as I wriggled a paw out from behind me and put it on her shoulder. "I still have feelings for her, too," I said quietly as I looked away from her. "I don't know how it's possible, but I seem to love two women."

My eyes caught the outfit she'd given me for Christmas, folded neatly on my dresser ready for use that weekend. It had been such a thoughtful gift, allowing me an additional set of weekend attire so Plagg could get his much needed downtime; the fingerless gloves were set just to the side, purrhaps the best gift of all, as they'd allowed me to physically touch her, something I'd never be able to do as Chat. A rush of shame and sadness quelled for the moment the raw impulses Marinette had been drawing out of me.

"I do," Marinette replied softly. "I understand."

My mane snapped back, ears askew and caught her gaze, blazing with the affection I'd long enjoyed. There was also a slight flush to her cheeks which hadn't been there before. "You… do?" I said, the confusion clear in my voice.

"Yes," she said, shaking her head a bit sadly. "It's my fault, actually. I've let this go longer than I should have."

"I don't understand," I said. "How is any of this _your_ fault? _I'm_ the one in the photos with Ladybug!"

"Oh, _kitty_," she said, smiling the smile that only I saw. "I absolutely adore how oblivious you chose to be."

"Oblivious?" I echoed. "What do you – ohmygodohmygod_ohmygod_-!" I breathed, for Marinette's hand had shot up to a feline ear and started to gently rub the tip between her fingers. It had long been my Achille's heel with her, as it typically laid waste my ability to deny her anything. And, given how high my emotions were running, the sensory overload nearly overwhelmed me. "Ma—Mari—"

She slowed but didn't stop her ministrations, and instead leaned as close to my feline ear as she could, tip-toes and all. "I know you love me, Chat," she whispered. "_Both_ of me."

"Both-?" I started, barely capable of cracking open one masked eye. What I _really_ wanted to do was another thing altogether. "What do you mean—"

The pink kwami floating in my line of sight was wearing a bemused expression. "Hello, Chat," she said with that sweetly melodic voice I'd only heard a few times before. "It's nice to see you again."

My masked eyes snapped wide open and shot to Marinette's blue ones. She was wearing a broad smile and nodding slowly. "Hello, kitty," she said. "_Now_ you understand."

And I did.

All of the little signs I'd seen over the years, the near misses; the small comments that, if I'd been paying attention, could only have come from someone who I saw in both guises. The face. The voice. The intelligence. The amazing body. The eyes.

Oh, those _eyes_.

I'd refused to see what was hiding in plain sight. Or had I? Some part of my feline brain simply clicked a button, almost like a shrug, really, that the reality had finally caught up with me. But now that I knew-

I looked back to Tikki, urgently. "But I _can't_ know!" I cried, suddenly worried. "She'll have to give it up! I can't – I _won't_ take that from her!"

Tikki continued to smile at me. "We've talked it over extensively, Chat. It's not terribly unusual for the Cat and Bug holders to become romantically involved – I've seen it happen many, many times, actually. But the two of you are different. You share a bond far deeper than any pair Plagg and I have worked with over the millennia."

The tiny Kwami of Creation flew to Marinette's shoulder. "I believe strongly you're both capable of handling the responsibilities of being holders, and the unusual dynamic required to pull off a successful, personal, loving relationship." Her tiny eyes looked back at me. "That you've both managed to stay together for as long as you have, _and_ successfully kept your identities from each other this entire time proves my point."

I felt as though I were a fish out of water, gasping for air as my world reordered itself around me. I ping-ponged between Tikki's perpetually kind expression and Marinette's expectant one, my feline brain processing the enormity of what had just transpired as fast as it's seemingly dated CPU could. In a whirl of thoughts, I realized I pretty much agreed with Tikki's assessment. The two of us were perhaps the _only _possible combination, really.

_Or_, I thought as a smile crept onto my face finally, _was that the four of us_?

Suddenly, I felt like I wanted to laugh maniacally at the insanity of just how we had wound up here.

"Milady?" I finally said, once I felt like I'd gotten my feet underneath me. "Does this mean I don't have to apologize now?"

"Maybe," she said with a sly smile. "But there is one thing you are defelinely on the hook for."

My masked eyes widened with worry. "What's that?"

In blur of motion, Marinette called for her transformation, temporarily blinding me with her red flash of magic. Before I had a chance to react, Ladybug had easily tossed me down upon my bed and quickly straddled me, much as she had back there on the rooftop. "You _finally_ have to make good on all of the innuendo."

As I stared up at the masked face of my partner – no, I mentally corrected, my _soulmate_ – I smiled in response. "The things I do for Milady," I purred as I reached up and pulled her down to me.

* * *

I awoke a little bit before sunrise with Ladybug snuggled into me, sleeping soundly with her head resting on one arm, my other wrapped around her possessively. It was a position I had fantasized about regularly as a teenager – oh, hell, if I were truly honest with myself, right up until I started dating Marinette seriously. They sometimes say that dreams are often better than reality; I felt I now had a compelling argument to the contrary.

What had awoken me, though, was the worry about how we went forward from here. For while I now knew who was beneath the Ladybug mask, we'd not quite gotten around to the other side of the equation. Back while we were attending University, there had been a moment when I thought Marinette had connected the dots behind the Chat mask, but she'd somewhat incredibly thought our mutual friend, Luka Couffaine, had been keeper of the Cat Miraculous.

At the time, I'd laughed at my good fortune and redoubled my efforts to obfuscate my true identity, having conveniently forgotten the multiple occasions Chat and Luka had been with Marinette _at the same time_. But now, leaning into my girlfriend and running a clawtip through the ribbon tying her hair, it dawned on me she'd known all along.

Part of me wondered if I should be angry that I'd had to keep up the charade when she had, in fact, divined who she'd moved in with; then again, it had also resulted in us keeping our relationship off the radar (for the most part, that is), something that would have been nearly impossible to do had Adrien been her boyfriend. And it wasn't lost on me that she seemed to prefer me in black leather during our more intimate time together in the apartment (her knitted hoodie notwithstanding).

Ladybug stirred, having felt my movements, and flipped around so she could face me. "Hey, kitty," she said sleepily. "This is a first for me, in case you're wondering."

I felt my face flush in the darkness. "Uh—" I choked.

"Sleeping transformed," she said quickly with that adorable smile. "But I should probably let Tikki out."

I smiled. "You get used to it," I replied, "though you never stop feeling guilty about what it does to the kwami."

Ladybug pushed herself up. "What does it do?" she asked, eyes wide. "Are they hurt?"

"Plagg says no, so long as we don't use our superpower. He can hold the transformation indefinitely, but to be honest, he gets kind of bored with nothing to do."

Her eyes widened more. "I never thought about that," she said.

"Hence my guilt," I smiled. "And endless purchases of Camembert."

Ladybug leaned up and kissed me. "I should go."

"Where?" I smiled crookedly. "Unless things have changed more than I realized, we, uh, live together. Still."

"True," she smiled wider. "But it's the first day after the holiday. At least one of us has to go to work. And the other, if I'm not mistaken, has a meeting with his competitor today."

My masked eyes widened. "I do? Today?"

She tapped my bell with a gloved finger. "Yes, my love. I'll have those new sketches for the Spring Show for you. The one you promised to model for me, if you recall."

I nodded slowly, my smile widening. "So, you _do_ know, then."

Flipping off of my bed and alighting in my doorway, she smiled back at me. "Of course I do. I'm Ladybug," she said, as if it were self-evident.

"Since the party?" I asked.

"Yes," she replied. "But I have to give you credit; even during our little lunch this fall, you didn't give yourself away."

I tapped my chest. "Black cat," I reminded her. "Good at stealth."

She rolled her eyes. "Right."

"Milady," I said, vaulting up to her side, "what exactly do we do now? You didn't move in with Adrien. It's going to look a little strange if I suddenly pop up here. Especially to my Father."

Ladybug nodded. "I know. We'll figure it out. For today at least, let's keep up appearances. We'll talk more tonight."

"Talk?" I asked, a mischievous smile on my face. "Or _talk_?"

"I don't understand," Ladybug replied, a frown appearing on her face.

I explained it to her by scooping her up with a shriek and landing the two of us back amongst the bedclothes.

"Kitty!" she cried out as I kissed her along her collar. "I have to go to work!"

"Chat's Air Express is operating this morning," I said as I started to work my way toward other spots, eliciting a bit of a gasp from my girlfriend. "Don't worry. You'll be on time."


	31. Progress, Interrupted

**Thirty-One: Progress, Interrupted**

_Author's Note: Now that the Chat is out of the bag – not to mention the Bug, as well – our duo has to decide how to live with their new reality. And, oh yeah, there's also that little matter of the interview they promised Alya..._

* * *

_Special Note: I have a ton of special Valentine's projects in the pipeline, so we're back to several shorter entries here in Roommates. Just for a bit. -ep_

* * *

I was perched atop the coffee table when Marinette returned from work, tail idly swishing as my masked eyes met hers the moment she entered the space. Having spent the majority of my time as Chat since moving in, it felt wrong hanging around the main spaces while not being transformed. Still, Marinette quirked an eyebrow as she placed her briefcase on the kitchen bar and slid onto the couch opposite me.

"Really?" she said with a smile.

"I'm not sure my feline brain has completely adjusted," I said, leaping over to the couch and laying myself across her lap. Marinette extended her legs to the coffee table as I let her stroke behind my feline ears. "Besides, you can't do this unless I'm Chat," I argued, my purring beginning to fill the room.

"You make a compelling argument," she agreed as she leaned down and kissed the spot between my feline ears. "I thought I made it obvious, though, that I love you no matter which persona you happened to be wearing at the moment."

"You did," I purred louder, happiness incarnate. "But I have a feline you purrfer this version of me."

I didn't have to see her face to know she had rolled her eyes, but I nonetheless received confirmation as she did that thing with the tip of my feline ear. We were halfway toward a fantastic evening when my baton started to buzz. Groaning, I rolled off Marinette's lap and stood, sliding out my baton and popping it open.

Rena's fox-themed face appeared on the small monitor, and my feline eyes flicked to Marinette. Since Alya didn't have Chat's number, it made sense she'd have transformed in order to reach out to me. "Rena, your timing sucks," I greeted, still a bit annoyed at her.

"You two owe me an interview, Chat. I can't reach Ladybug, which makes me think she's trying to duck her responsibilities."

"It's been less than a day since we talked, Rena," I growled. "I seem to recall that Ladybug was going to reach out to you to set the time and place." I paused and narrowed my masked eyes. "You're skating on thin ice here. Don't push your luck."

Rena seemed unmoved. "She's not called me yet," the fox persisted.

My masked eyes narrowed further. "Unlike this carefree tomcat, I'm sure she has obligations in her civilian life." I paused. "Much like I'm sure you do, fox," I growled a bit more until I felt Marinette's hand on my thigh. "We made a deal – and you know us well enough to know we won't back out."

"Chat-"

Suppressing a more dangerous growl, I kept my eyes planted on the screen. "I suppose you want it straight away, then."

"Tonight, yes. I have to go out of town tomorrow for a few days and want to get this done before I go."

"Where do you want to meet?"

"At the fountain in the park," Rena said.

"I'm not certain I'll be able to find Ladybug myself," I said. "As much as I know she pines away for me, it's not like she's sitting around, transformed and waiting for my call."

Out of the corner of a masked feline eye, I saw Marinette slap a hand over her mouth to keep from laughing.

"Tonight," Rena repeated firmly.

I sighed. "You really know how to kill a mood, Rena," I said a bit sullenly.

"You brought this on yourself, Chat," she said equally as tersely.

"That seems debatable," I replied in my dangerously quiet voice. I was more than a little annoyed with my friend; it troubled me greatly that she seemed to have no compunction about trading on her proximity to us in order to get a scoop.

Chasing stories had changed her – and not in a good way. More and more frequently she was taking serious risks to get the story, and in many ways didn't seem recognizable as our friend. Ladybug – well, Marinette, I suppose – had expressed concerns obliquely but this whole photo incident had thrown the issue into stark resolve. Rena had never failed us as a Miraculous holder, of course, but I'd be lying if I didn't think she'd started down a tough road as a journalist.

My eyes flicked briefly to Marinette, and I could see her thoughts were running parallel to mine. "All right, I'll prowl Paris until I locate her," I said to Rena. "I think, though, this will be the last time you'll be getting an exclusive from us."

Rena's eyes widened. "What do you mean?"

"See you tonight," I smiled grimly as I clicked off the call.

Sliding back onto the couch, I put my head on Marinette's shoulder. "Well, there goes the evening," I mewled. "This is _not_ how I planned on spending tonight," I said, emphasizing my point by tactically tracing a claw along the fabric of her shirt. "And we really need to talk about everything, too. I mean, do we still need two-"

Laughing, Marinette pulled me into an awkward hug. "We have plenty of time," she said softly as she stroked my mane again. "Once Alya gets her interview, I'll have a heart to heart with my friend to discuss..." she trailed off.

My feline ears perked up at her pause. "Milady?" I asked as I shifted to look at her.

"I think I have an idea," she said, eyes twinkling. "Are you up for a challenge?"

I narrowed my masked eyes. "Why does that worry me?"


	32. Paying the Piper

**Thirty-Two: Paying the Piper**

_Author's Note: Chat and Ladybug reluctantly meet with Alya, putting off their own discussion about their future in order to salvage their reputations with Paris._

* * *

As the hour approached for our meeting with Alya, I found myself perched on the railing of Marinette's rooftop patio atop the Dupain-Cheng Bakery. I was still a fairly regular visitor to the Bakery as Chat, since Sabine was constantly crafting care packages for us. That brought a cryptic smile to my feline visage, for the original stated reason had been that I could get back and forth far faster than Marinette, given my abilities when transformed. Now I finally understood how Marinette had been able to, quite literally, "swing by" the Bakery on her way home from time to time even though her office was halfway across the city.

I cocked my head, listening intently for Marinette to rise from the residence below; she was putting the finishing touches on her evil plan for our friend. And evil it was; given my admittedly earned reputation for destruction, what she had planned paled in comparison to anything I'd ever turned to ash. I'd had a small part in the drama myself; I patted a costume pocket to ensure I still had the items I'd borrowed from a rather surprised Nino a bit earlier. I rarely dropped in on him as Chat; doing so that evening had allowed me to (slightly) misuse his superhero worship to our benefit.

After all, I _was_ a black cat, and not above a little deception every now and again.

My eyes narrowed in delicious anticipation at what was to come; I rarely allowed the basal feline impulses out, but tonight I was looking forward to chasing _this _prey. I loved Alya as a friend, but had to admit to feeling a slight bit of betrayal. It hadn't helped that one particular shot of Ladybug and I had hit more than a million views on her blog; while my alter-ego might appreciate such notoriety, as Chat, I was cringing at how my very private life had become public fodder.

Neither of us had anything against the media; far from it. But Alya was a _friend_, both to the personas in the mask and out. That's probably why it was something of an open wound. Or, purrhaps, why my feline instincts were turned up to ten on the dial.

An ear flicked and I turned to watch Marinette appear from the skylight. She was obviously older now than when I first started to appear on her rooftop, but age had only served to make her far more beautiful. Gracefully, she slipped out and walked over to me, holding out a small package. "Hang on to those, too, kitty?" she asked. "I need to change into something a bit more appropriate."

She paused for a moment before tapping me on the nose. "And stop grinning so lecherously."

I laughed. "I'm sorry, Milady. I'm just not used to being able to watch you transform. And it really is something to behold."

"You've yet to return the favor, kitty," she smiled.

"Oh, I will," I replied, returning to my (slightly) lecherous grin.

One transformation later, the two of us took the long way around the buildings ringing the park beside the Bakery; it wouldn't do to give up another secret should Alya have been keeping an eye on our rooftop aerie (she wasn't, I'd been paying attention while studiously _not_ watching my girlfriend call on her kwami). Ladybug dropped down to the sidewalk on her yo-yo with the ease of many years of practice; I couldn't help a rather showy loop on one paw around a lamp post into a double barrel roll to standard crouch beside Milady.

"Really?" she said.

"Keeping in shape for the Olympics," I smiled.

"I didn't know they had a kitty division."

"Of course they do," I grinned. "Besides, who wouldn't want to watch an athlete in skintight-"

"_Chat_," Ladybug sighed. "Let's stay on point, shall we?"

"As you wish, Milady," I chuckled as I stood.

The two of us casually walked through the gate to the park, which at that late hour was bereft of patrons. The only activity was, predictably, the small setup Alya had arranged by the fountain: two lights, two cameras, and three chairs arranged for the interview. She was already seated in the one chair that was set against the remaining pair, flipping through her notebook and trying hard to look like she wasn't impatiently waiting for us.

Twirling my tail in one paw, I felt a dangerous smile appear on my face. "Alya."

The brown-haired journalist looked up and smiled. "Chat. Ladybug." She gestured to the seats in front of her. "Please, have a seat."

I leapt onto the chair and perched, boots and paws against the cushion. Ladybug raised an eyebrow but had known in advance I'd be doing it and instead demurely took her seat and crossed her legs. "No crew?"

Alya held up her smartphone. "I can control everything from here," she said. "And I figured you'd prefer a bit of privacy."

I raised a masked eyebrow. "But this will be streamed live?"

"Yes."

"Are you _absolutely_ sure you want to do that?" I said, my voice low and borderline growly.

"Yes."

I glanced at Ladybug and saw her nod her head so subtly I was sure Alya hadn't caught it. "All right. We're here. Let's get to it."

Alya tapped something on her phone and the two lights burst into life; I blinked a bit at the sudden brightness as Alya turned to look into the camera she'd placed behind us. I shifted slightly on my chair.

"Good evening," she said. "I'm here with the Heroes of Paris – Ladybug and Chat Noir – with an exclusive interview..."

I kept my masked eyes firmly planted on Alya as she proceeded to recite something of an essay to explain to her viewers why we were all there. As I watched her, I snuck my tail up behind me and poised it just over the illuminated paw print on my baton. Or where I thought the paw print should be; despite how many years it had been carefully stashed at the small of my back, it had still taken a few minutes of practice in front of my bathroom mirror to get the position just right.

Glancing at Ladybug, I saw her shift the position of her hand against her arm. _Ready?_ she was asking.

I dipped my head forward at an appropriate point in Alya's soliloquy, effecting to look chastened. _Yes_, was my response.

Ladybug tapped her finger. _Ok_.

"...so they've agreed to speak to me, on the record, to help straighten out this situation." Alya turned to me. "Chat, isn't it true that you are actually in a relationship with someone else?"

I looked up. "Yes," I said simply.

Alya looked a bit nonplussed, as if she'd expected me to protest a bit. Regrouping, she continued. "And... and how did she take it, finding out you were cheating on her?"

It took an amazing amount of willpower not to smile. "Better than I expected," I said, dipping my head again, allowing my unruly bangs to fall forward. I knew it made me look vulnerable having used it multiple times over the years in my modelling. "In fairness, my girlfriend was well aware of my history with Ladybug."

Alya pounced on what sounded like a juicy story. "So... you _do_ have a past together, then?"

"Yes," Ladybug said. "But after you published that photo of us kissing atop Montparnasse, we had to make the tough decision and break up."

"You - wait, _what_?"

"It was tough, actually," I said, looking up. I'd managed to get teary eyed and dramatically caught my breath. "We were in love, even back then, but your photo proved to us we couldn't be together."

Ladybug leaned over and put a hand to my bicep. "It's okay, Chat." She looked up to Alya. "It was hard, but we knew for the good of Paris, we could never be together."

I let out a sob and even more dramatically turned away, wiping a tear from my eye with a claw.

"I thought – you _said_ you had no memory of what happened!"

"We needed a cover story," I said, tears flowing down my mask now. "It was the best we could come up with on such short notice." I looked lovingly at Ladybug. "We've had to live with that decision for years, now, haven't we Bugaboo?"

Ladybug's mouth quirked. "Yes, kitty," she replied, taking my paw into her hand. "I'm sorry. I didn't know until recently how much it hurt you – it hurt _me_."

That was my cue. As I continued to look into Ladybug's eyes, my tail quickly tapped a sequence into the baton; a chirp only I could hear told me the cellular/Wi-Fi disruption function had activated. Our assumption was that Alya was livestreaming using her mobile phone as a hotspot, but just to be safe, I'd gone for a broad-spectrum shield. With luck, the three of us were now very much alone.

"Ladybug, what I did – what we did-" I said, giving my partner _her_ cue.

She nodded subtly. "It was a one-time thing," she said softly. "My significant other – like yours – has seen the pictures and we've had a long, long conversation about it."

I felt my mouth quirk slightly, for we'd done far more than _talk_. I continued to look at her, and knew that Alya was paying rapt attention to our discussion; enough that she didn't see my other paw slowly unzip my costume pocket. "He forgave you?" I asked, knowing the answer.

"After a fashion," she replied. _Now_.

In a blur of motion, I had the items from my pocket out and vaulted into a standing position in front of the camera. "By the way, we have some photos to share, too."

"Chat - what are you-"

"Here's Alya with – gosh, isn't that the famous model, Adrien Agreste?" I said, making a show of examining the photo. It was the two of us at a party years earlier; she was laughing and hugging me, much like friends do, but... "Wow, Alya, I had no idea."

Ladybug put a gloved hand to her mouth in shock. "Wasn't that _after _you were engaged?"

Alya snatched the photo out of my paw. "This isn't what it looks like," she said.

"Or this one?" I said, holding up a photo of her sharing a bed with Luka Couffaine. "That looks cozy."

"Where did you get these?" she cried, snatching that one from my paw. "We were on a-"

"Wow, look at this one, Ladybug," I said, voice dripping with irony. "The most romantic place on Earth-"

"_Give me those!_" Alya cried as she dove for the fistful of photos I had in my paw.

Deftly, I leapt up and away from her, landing on the upper tier of the fountain. "I don't think so," I said. "The public have a right to know all the facts."

"At least," Ladybug said, "based on what _you_ told us, Alya. No matter how private. Isn't that right?"

"Those are different!" she cried, glaring at me. "Those are personal moments!"

"Exactly," I said coldly. "Just like the one Ladybug and I shared on that rooftop."

"That's not the same-"

"Now, let's talk a bit about how you _got_ those photos," Ladybug said. "How _did_ you get on that rooftop Alya?"

"What?" Alya said, flushing slightly. "I took the elevator."

"Ah," I said, tail twisting. "You mean the one that was offline for maintenance?"

"Oh, no – I took the stairs, that's right."

"Really," Ladybug said as she nodded to me.

I unzipped my other pocket and tossed to Ladybug the small Miraculous box and photo she'd asked me to hold. "Oops," I said. "Where did that come from?"

Ladybug flipped the photo over; it was an action shot of Rena soaring through the air. Marinette had cropped out the other three of us from the photo, making it appear that Rena was leaping to a rooftop. "That's quite a shot."

"Yes," Alya said, but her eyes were on the box.

"I see you've noticed what I'm holding," Ladybug said.

"What... what is that?" she asked, trying to play it cool; but I could tell there was a slight tremor in her voice.

"This is a Miraculous Box," Ladybug said. "I'm not sure I should be showing it to you, or your fans," Ladybug added, playing to the cameras, "for they are a closely guarded secret. I'm not sure everyone knows the level of trust required for members of my team. Holding a Miraculous, even for a short period of time, is a serious responsibility."

Alya swallowed.

"I don't select members lightly," she continued. Ladybug looked back at me and, after a long moment, tossed the box up to me.

Alya visibly relaxed.

Ladybug stood and stepped over to Alya. "Much like the photos, you can see that context is sometimes needed for certainty. Wouldn't you agree, Chat?"

"Absolutely," I nodded.

"Without context, you could be forgiven perhaps for drawing conclusions that aren't correct."

"Indeed," I smiled down at Alya.

Ladybug leaned down to her friend. "I am very upset at what you did," she whispered. "Whatever you thought you saw, whether what we were doing was right or wrong, it wasn't for you to judge." Ladybug snatched the photo of Alya and Adrien back. "As you can now see, photos can be read in many ways. By many people."

I pulled out my baton and disabled the Wi-Fi blocker as I dropped back into my seat. "So while I love Ladybug," I continued as if nothing had happened, "I am deeply in love with my girlfriend."

"As am I with my boyfriend," Ladybug said sweetly. "Well, I think that about does it. Unless you had anything further, Alya?"

"No," Alya said quickly. "Thank you – thank both of you for your time."

"Chat?" Ladybug said as she took my paw. "Shall we?"

"After you, Milady," I bowed and then we leapt up into the air.

I helicoptered to reach a nearby roof, landing next to Ladybug as she dropped out of the sky. Together we slowly jogged side-by-side until we were well away from the park and Bakery, stopping by prearrangement on an angled set of tiles facing the lit Eiffel Tower.

"Well," I said as I settled in next to my girlfriend. "What do you think?"

Ladybug leaned into my shoulder. "We bought some time," she said. "But she'll be back in the hunt for another scoop sooner than later, I fear."

"That's what I thought, too," I said. "Especially when she realizes we essentially deleted the middle part of her exclusive interview." I turned slightly. "I thought you were going to relieve her of her Miraculous?"

"I was," she said. "But I felt like a warning was more in order. For now."

"Lovely," I sighed.

"Don't fret, Chat," she said as she ran a finger around the metal accent on my arm. "Marinette is going to visit Alya tomorrow – after seeing the interview, of course – and ensure Alya got the point."

"Do you want-"

"No," she smiled. "I can do this myself. Now," she said as she stood, "I could really use a drink. You?"

"I could have used one _before_ the interview, Milady."

_"_I needed you to have your wits about you, kitty," she laughed. "Come on, let's go home. We've got a lot to talk about ourselves."

"That we do," I said, kissing her. "That we do."


	33. Due in Full

**Thirty-Three: Due In Full**

_Author's Note: Marinette and Chat need to have a chat, but not before Marinette catches up with her best friend to try and temper her escapades with the Ladyblog._

* * *

The sun was just beginning to peek through my bedroom window the morning after our live-streamed interview with Alya. We hadn't gotten back to the apartment until well after midnight, and to my joyous surprise, Ladybug had followed me through the sliding glass doors from my balcony and straight into my king-sized bed. Caught a bit off guard, I watched her drop her transformation and then beckon me to join her. It didn't take much for this cat to pounce, and I quickly curled around her and purred the two of us to sleep.

Now, as the room brightened slowly, I knew neither Marinette nor I wanted to go to work. Running the proverbial company allowed _me_ an amazing amount of freedom, but that was not the case (yet) for Marinette. While I was tempted to call in sick, I knew that as a junior designer, missing any amount of time at this stage of her career could be fatal to Marinette's future. Still, I waited another five minutes, enthralled by the exotic scent of my partner, and the gentle _thumpa-thumpa_ sound of her heart in my feline ears.

Reluctantly, I finally leaned my mane over slightly and nibbled on her shoulder to encourage her to get up. It didn't have the desired result, for Marinette responded by snuggling closer to me and pulling my arm over her before sighing contentedly. "I could stay nestled into you all day," she murmured lazily.

"While I wouldn't necessarily disagree with that course of action," I whispered into her ear, "you really need to get to work." My purring may have blunted the impact of my words.

Marinette turned slightly to look at me, and smiled.

"What?" I asked.

"You don't have to stay transformed any longer," she said, "but I'll be honest. Between the skin-tight leather and those insanely cute feline ears of yours…"

I twisted one sideways as I ran a claw through her bed-mussed hair. While we'd been living together for more than half a year now, the need for me to conceal my true identity had prevented us from going beyond rather intimate snuggling on our perfectly-sized couch due to my remaining transformed. But since the reveal, I was starting to suspect that we were close to going where no Chat had gone before.

Thinking about that made me flush slightly.

At her request, I'd stayed transformed that night, though I hadn't been entirely sure why. I'd long suspected she had a thing for the costume, though, and now had confirmation. It was hard to hide the Chat-sly smile. "It's all part of my devious plan, Princess."

"And that would be?"

"I distract you with my kitty antics with the sole purpose of getting you into my bed," I said, trying to mask my slight anxiety as this turn of events with feline bravado.

She smiled wider and pulled my face closer to hers. "It seems to be working," she observed before kissing me in such a way as to remind me what I was giving up by insisting we go to work.

My traitorous purring notched up more when she devilishly started to scratch behind an ear. "Milady," I managed to get out, "if you keep going, I can't be held responsible—"

Marinette paused and pulled back slightly, showing me a wicked smile. "The costume still doesn't come off," she reminded me with mock seriousness.

"That was _before_ you knew who was under the mask," I rejoined. "And as… urgently… as I would like to explore this added dimension of our relationship-" I gasped as her hand wafted past a rather sensitive area.

She smiled wider. "Is that what we're calling it?"

"Fur now," I breathed, amazed at what the woman I loved could do to me. "But we have things to discuss, I think, beforehand. And," I swallowed hard, trying to focus, "there is _still_ the little matter of both of us getting to work on time."

"Oh, you had to say that four letter word, didn't you?" she laughed as she gave my mane one last scratch. "All right, consider this a… tease… of things to come," she added as she slid out from under the sheet.

Trying to get my breathing regular, I decided to nod… and keep under the sheet for a moment or two.

"I'm going to run through the shower. Do you mind dropping me off?" she asked as she stretched slightly. The black of the Chat Noir t-shirt she'd purrloined from my dresser popped against her soft ivory skin but clashed horribly with the Ladybug lounge pants she'd similarly stolen.

Or did they? I smiled. _Not as much as you'd think_, I thought.

"Yes," I said finally. "But you can get there just as fast on your yo-yo."

"We'll talk about that tonight," she smiled over her shoulder. "But like you observed earlier, we still need to keep up appearances for a bit. And that means Chat Noir is still my boyfriend."

"Happy to oblige," I laughed.

Marinette paused at my door. "Damn," she breathed.

In a flash, I was out of the bed and had her in my arms. "What's wrong?"

"I forgot. I scheduled drinks with Alya after work."

"You want me—"

"No," she said quickly.

"I can wait in the shadows," I offered. "You might want me."

"No," she said a bit more slowly. "But I'll think about it," she added when she saw me making Doll Eyes at her.

I nibbled at her neck, then flicked my tongue slightly in a spot that I knew would elicit a moan.

"All right!" she breathed, her voice tight. "We're going to the hotel bar at the Grand Hotel. Meet me there close to five." She twisted around and kissed me. "You play dirty, Chat."

"I'm not above using feline tricks to get what I desire," I purred.

* * *

Work was… well, work; my mind was elsewhere all day. Well, not exactly elsewhere – it was focused like a laser on one Marinette Dupain-Cheng and the conversation we were going to have later. The more basal feline parts of me were pushing to skip the conversation altogether and move into the other aspects the evening was purromising, but we had to get through the meet-up with Alya first.

In the end, I escaped from my assistant and ran up the emergency staircase to the roof of our building, transforming to Chat Noir as I took the steps two at a time. Bursting from the door, I vaulted into the air and helicoptered over to the building next to ours, then ran full-tilt across the skyline of Paris to try and beat Marinette to the Grand Hotel. As I made my way high above the late afternoon commuter traffic, I wondered for a brief moment about our old acquaintance, Chloe Bourgeois. As far as we knew, she was still in New York; every so often, I would "like" a post of hers on Instagram, but hadn't had a real conversation with her since the night we'd saved her at the college party. Despite all of the trauma she'd wreaked in our lives over the years, I sincerely hoped she was doing well.

Dropping onto a lamppost across the street, I perched with my tail swishing below me as I scanned for my girlfriend. My masked eyes popped wide open, though, when I caught the telltale brown hair and fox ears of Rena Rouge as she dropped out of the sky to land on the Metro stop opposite where I was perched.

_Oops_._ So much for not attracting attention. Ladybug is gonna kill me. Again._

"Rena," I said, nodding.

"Chat," she smiled, though it held no trace of warmth. I wondered once more where my friend of many years had gone, or if she were just buried beneath the callouses the journalism she pursued had created. "Not a coincidence you're here this evening, is it?" she intuited.

"I hear the restaurant has a special on tuna tonight," I cooed, licking my lips in exaggerated slow motion. "All you can eat for fifteen Euros. What cat wouldn't want in on that?"

"I can think of a few," she said. "And they have a strict dress code at the Grand."

"What? I'm in black tie," I said.

"I think the bell might not get you past the hostess."

My feline sense of smell picked up Marinette's approach. Though she was still a few blocks away, I figured a tactical retreat was in order. "Probably right," I smiled. "I'll just go home and change first," I added with a bit of snark before I leapt away and rode my baton upward to gain access to the roof of the building behind me.

Making a visible show of running away from the hotel, once I was out of line-of-sight I ducked behind an HVAC unit and cracked open my baton to the tracker mode. Rena's fox icon was moving to a side alley by the hotel and then vanished a moment later; I waited a few long heartbeats before galloping on all fours across the roof to the edge. Peering just above the filigree, my feline eyes caught Alya as she rounded the hotel and entered through the main double glass doors. Marinette was only a few steps behind her, but the timing was such that she'd likely not seen Alya ahead of her.

Leaping over the edge, I helicoptered higher so I could reach the pool atop the hotel. Landing in a crouch, I trotted to the stairway door and pulled it open. Several cat leaps later, I had my feline ear to the exit leading to the mezzanine over the atrium. If my memory was correct, the bar was just below, though I'd not completely considered how to stay hidden in such an open space.

Cracking the door open slightly once I was sure no one was on the other side, I confirmed I was a few steps from the ornate railing overlooking the bar; unfortunately, there wasn't so much as a fern in the space. Closing the door, I leaned against the inner wall and closed my masked eyes. So much for surreptitious surveillance. I'd need a break now – or at least, a more inspired approach.

On cue, the door from the level below me flew open.

"I quit!" came a cry, along with the clatter of equipment being tossed to the concrete treads. The zipping and Velcro noises had me raise my masked eyebrows, and I stalked to the railing of the landing to peer below.

A thin man was issuing epithets at the now closed door to the floor below me as he peeled himself out of a banana costume – one that I knew well. I couldn't help the smile that came to my masked visage as he threw the day-glow yellow costume into a heap of fabric before stomping down to the floor below and the employee garage.

I waited a few moments before curling over the railing and landing in a crouch beside the costume. The clattering noise appeared to be an equipment belt with a small air pump and a pocket full of multi-colored balloons. My smile grew wider as I picked up the costume and started with plan B.

Needing my feline hearing, I opted to remain transformed, though the tips of my feline ears brushed uncomfortably against the top of the costume. Getting my claws into the Lycra arms was a challenge, too; I wound up puncturing the fingertips of the gloves in the end, and wondered how folding balloons was going to work.

Snapping the belt around my midsection, I pulled open the door and walked out into the atrium – the very essence of a modern banana man.


	34. Candid Candor

**Thirty-Four: Candid Candor**

_Author's Note: Making use of a discarded costume, Chat sneaks into the bar at the Grand Hotel to eavesdrop on Marinette's conversation with Alya._

* * *

The bar was just in front of me, and I tacked toward it until my arm was arrested.

Turning, I could see a kid of no more than seven. "I want a balloon!" he yelled, his red face tear-stained and speaking to what had to have been a trying afternoon for the parent who was sitting with him.

"Stay peachy!" I replied as I tried to move away.

"I! Want! _Balloon!_" he screamed. To my genuine surprise, he started to smack the outside of the banana costume, immediately bringing to mind those reports of Disney characters getting pummeled by tourists.

"Can we get one?" the mother pleaded with me, her own hand on my arm now. "Please?"

Growling under my breath, I nodded (as best as I could in a banana costume) and turned to face the intimate tableau. The mother sank back into the couch where she'd been sitting, a small cocktail on the sidearm with a damp napkin; her child was on the cushion next to her, with a coloring book and crayons scattered everywhere.

"And what kind of balloon do you want?" I said as I pulled out the pump, hoping no one would realize it was Chat Noir's voice coming out of the banana.

"I want a pirate's hat!"

My feline eyes fell to the coloring book and groaned as I saw he was, indeed, coloring a buccaneer's vessel. "Seriously? Don't you want a giraffe? Or a frog? How about a cat—"

"Pirate! _Hat!_" he screamed.

Sighing, I pulled out several balloons and started to work, unsure of exactly what I was doing but furrvently hoping the kid wouldn't know any different. Another quick glance at the mother confirmed that she was grateful for a few moments to herself and was quite fortunately paying little attention to my efforts. Through the hazy film of the eyes of the banana costume, I could see Alya and Marinette were waiting by the hostess at the entrance to the small bar just a few meters away from me; from their body language, neither appeared interested in chatting until they'd had at least one shot of something, preferably strong.

I hadn't noticed when Marinette was dressing to leave that morning she'd put on one of her handmade scarves; it was of the same soft fabric as the outfit she'd gifted me a few months earlier – the one allowing me to pad around the apartment without my transformation so Plagg could enjoy some much-needed downtime. It had been such a kind gesture, allowing me to shed the costume for nearly an entire weekend at a time—

My feline ears snapped straight up, smashing into the top of the costume; grimacing at the discomfort, I tried to process the connection my fur brain had just made while keeping the balloon in my paws intact. The day she'd given the outfit to me, she'd also been wearing that extremely form-fitting Lady Noir costume, hadn't she? And what had I said?

_Should I be worried about anything you did to me while I was sleeping?_ I'd asked.

_Most definitely,_ she had replied.

I squeezed my masked eyes shut in frustration. All these months, she'd been carefully letting me know she was ready – even before the reveal; crafting the mask and outfit had just been another waypoint on the journey, one I had been a tad oblivious to. Again.

It took an amazing amount not to do a facepaw. I could really be dense at times, couldn't I? And yet, true to form, Milady had patiently waited for me to catch up. It made me wonder now if the very event that she was even now just sitting down to talk to Alya about had been borne out of a tiny bit of frustration that I'd not been on the same page with my girlfriend.

I had to admit, I was all caught up now; my eyes narrowed a bit, anticipating just how I would… explain to her that I was not only caught up, I was ready to read the next chapter together, too. The mask and outfit would be making an appearance, that much I was sure. Not that I needed it any longer: just long enough for me to let her know in my own way I finally understood.

Turning slightly, I discovered I had a reasonably clear line of sight the table across the way where Alya and Marinette had just settled in and were ordering their first round. I focused my feline ears in their direction while I wrestled with the balloon arts-and-crafts project in my paws.

"You wanted to talk?" Alya said. I could pick up the barest trace of an undercurrent.

"Yeah," Marinette replied. "I'm just going to cut to the chase. Clearly you already know I'm dating Chat."

"Yes."

"Would you mind explaining yourself, then?"

"About what?"

"Are those claws?" the kid suddenly cried out, forcing me to turn my attention back to the balloon in my gloved paws.

"No," I said curtly as I attempted to twist the long cylinder I'd created without popping it with… my claws.

"Those _look_ like claws," he said suspiciously as he slid off the couch and stood next to me.

Thinking fast, I knelt down to his height and whispered. "They _are_ claws. Can you keep a secret?"

The kid looked at me with that sincere seriousness they can sometimes get, and nodded.

I made a show of looking around me (quite a task in a banana, I might add), then whispered: "I'm actually Chat Noir, and I'm on a secret mission. I could use some help, if only I could find someone."

His eyes went wide. "You're… Chat Noir?" he whispered back.

"In the fur," I said. "But this has to be between us. Do you know anyone who might be able to help me?"

"I'll do it!" he said excitedly. "What do you need?"

Grinning, though he couldn't see it, I said: "Well, it requires some acting. Can you do that?"

"Yes!"

"Okay, then." I leaned further. "I need you to _pretend_ that I am crafting you the most amazing balloon hat ever. And then I'm going to make you a giraffe."

"Okay!" he said, then he lowered his voice to a confidential level (which, for seven-year-old was really just a loud stage whisper). "Then… will you Cataclysm it for me?"

I blinked. "If this works, sure," I said hesitantly. "Now you know _my_ name – what's yours?"

"Sam," he smiled.

"Nice to meet you, Sam," I said.

Sam slid back up on his couch and suddenly was on his best behavior; I had no idea something as darkly negative as Cataclysm could be used as a pawsitive tool in that way. As I started back in on the muddle that was supposed to be his pirate hat, I twisted my feline ears back toward Marinette, and frowned.

"…protecting you," Alya was saying. "Chat was stepping out on you!"

"That's not exactly what he did," Marinette replied. "What you captured in those photos—"

"Girl, your _boyfriend_ was getting it on with Miss Pearl Pureheart. There's no other way to look at it."

I could hear Marinette sighing. "Alya, you're my best friend. I can't believe you're not listening to me. I'm not upset with Chat; he explained to me what happened. He and Ladybug go back further than he and I do; did you know he had an insane crush on her?"

"It was kind of _obvious_." Alya had to have rolled her eyes. "He's been googly-eyed over her since they first appeared."

Marinette paused. "I didn't know that, Alya. That's my point. And what's more, Ladybug is the one that pushed Chat."

"He willingly went where she was leading him."

I blinked. It wasn't exactly untrue; I'd follow Ladybug anywhere. Especially these days, now that I knew who she was. I felt my face warm a bit thinking how willingly I'd followed her into my bed just that morning. There was no question she had me wrapped around her little finger… and I couldn't be happier.

"Of course he did," Marinette replied. "Why wouldn't he? It was Ladybug, the woman he was in love with before me. Now there she is, suddenly all over him. Doing things to him that he'd probably only fantasized about."

I blinked again, wondering if she was speaking more to me than Alya. My face heated up again. As Marinette appeared to take a sip of her cocktail, I handed Sam his "hat" and started on his giraffe. Per our agreement, he fawned all over it, despite it being nothing more than a tangled mess of half-inflated balloons. Twisted my ears again, I caught Marinette starting.

"How long were you there?"

"Long enough."

"Your pictures only show the two of them entangled. Did you see what transpired five minutes earlier? The day before?"

"Well, no, but I saw—"

"What you wanted to see." I heard Mari put her glass down on the glass surface of her table, the ice cubes jangling. "Look, here's the thing. I am actually rather pissed at you."

"You—what?"

"Chat and I had been keeping our relationship off the radar for just this kind of reason. You exposed us with those photos you took at the train station; that forced us to keep even further out sight. Do you have any idea how hard it is to date someone that you can't even take _out_? It's not like we can go to a restaurant, anyway, but after you pulled that stunt, we didn't feel all that comfortable with him even getting takeout for a rooftop."

"I don't understand—"

"Paparazzi, Alya. They followed me everywhere for weeks afterward. Just for a chance to get a shot of me with Chat." Marinette paused again. "It had finally died out. But this has thrown me back into the spotlight again. I saw the headline on the paper yesterday – 'Ladybug Steals Boyfriend from Local Designer' – how do I explain that to my boss, exactly? Who until today didn't know I _was_ dating a Hero of Paris?"

I tried not to laugh. Her boss actually _did_ know about me, but the point was well made.

"So, not to put too fine a point on it – you've outed my relationship to the city, twice now; and the second time around, you accused Ladybug of, what, exactly?"

"Sleeping with your boyfriend," Alya said, somewhat subdued.

"And did she?"

"Well, it looked like—"

"What?" Marinette paused again, and this time I knew she was about to go in for the kill. "Did you see anything along those lines? For your photos didn't capture that particular moment."

"It was in progress."

"Was it? For I was rather under the impression that those costumes don't come off, Alya. And knowing Chat as well as I do, I highly doubt he would have let it go beyond the kissing you so vibrantly _did_ capture. Whatever you might think of my feline boyfriend, he _is_ and continues to _be_ the purrfect gentleman."

Alya was silent.

"You're my friend, right? Because I'm having a seriously hard time understanding why my _friend_ did this to me." Marinette dropped her voice a little. "And I also don't know how you managed to get those photos in the first place. Unless you were, like, a Miraculous holder?" Another pause. "You aren't, are you?"

"Uh—no, I'm not," Alya said hastily.

"That's good. I'm reasonably sure Ladybug would frown on any holder who used their Miraculous for personal reasons." She paused. "Were you actually a holder."

"She would," Alya concurred quietly. "Thank goodness I'm not," Alya laughed nervously.

"I don't know what's happened to you, Alya," Marinette continued. "This is not the budding journalist I once knew. You seem to have thrown your ethics out the window in pursuit of the big story."

"It's a tough industry."

"Really. You had been doing quite well for yourself – what changed?"

"Nothing has changed. I'm just getting better at my job."

"That's debatable. Look, if you still value our relationship – lay off the Heroes of Paris, would you? Or, if that is too much of an ask, leave Chat and I out of it for a bit? Until the buzz wears down again?"

"No," Alya said. "The public have a right to know-"

"Everything about my private life?" Marinette said, her voice barely controlled. "And Chat's? Where's the public good served in either of us being put on display?"

"You chose to be in the public eye when you started dating him, Mari. Don't blame me for what your own actions caused."

My claw popped the balloon I was working on, betraying my anger; fortunately, no one really noticed, save Sam. I pulled a new one out and started over.

"You can't seriously be putting this on _me_, Alya," Marinette whispered.

"I am."

There was a long, long moment before Marinette started again. "Wow." I heard her rustling around in her purse. "Just. Wow." Another pause. "I think I need to take a step back for a bit, then."

"From what?"

"From… us." She took a breath, and I could hear the strain in her voice. "I need to consider what this means with respect to our friendship."

"Fine with me."

"Really," Marinette said, a bit of shock coming out. "After everything? And as long as we've known each other?"

"Yes."

I heard Mari toss her money on the table. "Goodbye, Alya."

That was my cue, and I handed Sam his giraffe (which was more like two balloons tied together). "Stand back," I whispered.

"Okay!" he smiled.

I snuck a peek to ensure the coast was clear and kneeled down, peeling off the glove from my ring hand. "Cataclysm!" I whispered, then brushed his balloons with a clawtip.

Sam's eyes went wide as they crumbled to ash and wafted away. "Wow…!"

"Gotta scat," I said as I pulled the glove back on. "Nice to meet you, Sam."

"Same, Ch—Banana!"

I scurried back to the stairwell, shedding the costume as soon as I was through the door. Ignoring the chirping from my ring, I leapt upwards and caught the railing to pull myself even higher. Bursting through the rooftop door, I ran full tilt to the edge of the roof and dove off, using the baton to hook the side of the building enough to do a giant one-arm roll into a double-barrel twist that landed me back on the original lamppost from before. A fraction of a moment later, Marinette pushed out through the door to the hotel, head down and walking deliberately toward me.

Vaulting, I soared up into the air and arced down to her, scooped her up into my paws and used the baton to press us upwards toward the rooftops and anonymity. I could feel she was sobbing against my shoulder as she wrapped her arms around me, tightly.

"It's okay," I said, ignoring the second chirp from my ring as I headed toward home. "I've got you."

"Good," she said. "'Cause I could really use a friend tonight, some purring therapy… and a drink." She paused again. "A very, very, stiff drink."

I laughed in an attempt to lighten her mood. "I think I can accommodate _all_ of your requests, Milady."


	35. Purrfect Therapy

**Thirty-Five: Purrfect Therapy**

_Author's Note: Unexpectedly diverted to the Bakery after meeting with Alya, Chat and Marinette spend the night in her old chambers – and take solace in the company of each other._

* * *

_**Author's Warning:** Please remember that the characters of Chat and Marinette as depicted in _Roommates _are consenting adults who have graduated from University and are chronologically in their early twenties. Stated simply, they are grown-ups in a serious, loving relationship with each other. While this story remains firmly within the bounds of the Teen rating attached to it, there is plenty of innuendo within this chapter that readers who are uncomfortable with suggestive content may wish to avoid. No one will think any less of you for skipping to the next chapter. ;-)_

* * *

Despite normally having no issues sneaking in or out of the apartment through my side balcony entrance under the cover of darkness, I generally still took a circuitous route on the off chance anyone tried to track my movements. With my ring chirping as it was, however, I'd nearly opted to make a beeline for my safe harbor when that undefinable bonus feline sense I had kicked in. Marinette picked up my sudden shift in direction despite being emotionally compromised at the moment and whispered into a feline ear. "What is it?"

"Rena," I said simply as we dropped out of the sky and onto a rooftop.

Marinette said some nasty words as the two of us dashed behind a chimney and pressed ourselves into the darkness.

"Milady, such language," I teased quietly as I peered around an edge to see our pursuer.

"I don't even _know_ her any longer," Marinette replied with a deep sigh. "This whole thing has been totally out of character."

"People can change," I murmured, masked feline eyes narrowing as they caught sight of the Fox. "Damn. She's just a few blocks behind us and closing." Pulling out my baton, I clicked over the to the tracking app and held the screen out to Marinette. "She had to have picked us up shortly after leaving the hotel."

"Why? Why would she follow us, especially after our conversation?"

"I am very much wanting to know the answer to that myself." I smiled grimly. "My guess? She's trying to divine the location of our apartment," I said as I snapped the baton shut. "I should have anticipated this move, though, for I caught her outside the hotel arriving as Rena."

"She _what_?"

I turned toward Marinette. "I heard what you said to her – about using her Miraculous for purrsonal reasons." My masked eyes widened. "In my defense—"

"We'll talk about that later. For now, though, we need to evade Rena. And that means not going home with her hot on your cute-but-recognizable feline tail."

I smirked. "You noticed? How sweet," I purred.

She pushed my nose away from a potential kiss. "I'm open to suggestions, kitty."

Looking out across the cityscape, I smiled a bit wider. "We're just a few blocks from the Bakery," I pointed out happily. "Will your parents take in some strays for a night?"

"Are you kidding?" she asked as she held her arms out for me to pick her up. "Papa wanted to adopt you that first time you came over for dinner."

I frowned at her as I leapt up to the side of the wall. "That would've made it hard for me to marry you," I observed.

Marinette turned her head toward me. "You haven't, yet," she said softly.

I shrugged as I leapt into the night with my precious cargo. "It's on my timeline," I laughed. "This little reveal courtesy of Alya has thrown my plans into disarray." I glanced at her quickly. "Trust me, you won't escape my attentions that easily."

"Good," she said as she leaned back into me.

In moments, the Bakery loomed large and I landed on the familiar confines of the rooftop patio. Setting Marinette down, I stood guard as she descended the skylight to inquire as to room availability at the impromptu inn; turning, I watched as Rena not-so-subtly landed on the roof opposite. I couldn't help the two-finger salute with accompanying partial snarl and was rewarded with my baton buzzing.

"Nice diversion," the small image of Rena said when I snapped open the phone.

"What makes you think Marinette lives anywhere other than here?" I asked, arching a masked eyebrow. My ring chirped again and I knew I was down to three pads.

"That seems doubtful. Sooner or later, I'll manage to trace one or both of you."

My masked eyes widened. That actually was good news, for it told me this was Alya's first attempt to track down Marinette's apartment. She'd hate my recommendation, but probably wouldn't argue with coming and going as Ladybug so she could keep a watchful eye out for Rena. "Why the obsession with us, Rena? We're your friends and teammates for crying out loud."

"I need to get to the truth," Rena said in a brief moment of candor. "I'm owed that."

I blinked. "I don't understand. What is it you think you don't know?"

"It's not just for me," Rena said. "Paris deserves to know who the Miraculous Vigilantes are – revealed to the world. No secrets."

_Vigilantes?_

"Rena," I said carefully, "those secrets protect our friends – our families! If you follow through on this, you'll hand Hawkmoth what he needs to get to us."

"Chat, it's not right – it's not fair that Ladybug knows who we are, and we aren't allowed!"

"It's part of the deal," I reminded her.

"Does she know who you are?" Rena asked suddenly. "The person under the mask?"

"No," I said smoothly, leaning on my model training to keep from betraying anything.

Rena looked at me. "You seriously expect me to believe that Marinette is _willingly_ living with someone who is hiding their true identity from her?"

"Yes," I replied. "For while she might not know my true name, she does know _who_ I am. And at the end of the day, that's all that matters, isn't it?"

She glared at me. "It wouldn't be for me."

"You're not Marinette, either," I shot back.

"Chat—"

"Good night, Rena," I said as I clicked the phone shut and quickly dropped through the skylight.

A rather surprised Marinette greeted me in the space. "I was just coming up—"

"I just spoke with Rena," I explained with a tiny growl appended.

"That good?"

Shaking my mane, I hopped onto her chaise, somewhat amazed that Marinette's old room was nearly intact from her days of living at the bakery. "It would be best if you didn't go up there right now. She's keeping watch."

"Why?"

"She appears to be on the anti-secret brigade currently."

Marinette rolled her eyes. "That's rather extraordinary, given she, herself, is a Miraculous Holder."

"Exactly." I blew a bang away from my mask in frustration.

"Speaking of keeping secrets, my parents are fine with us staying over; unfortunately, the guest room is full of supplies, so we'll have to stay here in my old room." She grinned at me wickedly. "Together."

My masked eyes narrowed. "Your father must not have liked that."

Marinette slid onto the chaise next to me, and I curled my tail around her waist. Continuing to grin wickedly, she tapped my bell with a finger. "I reminded him I am no longer his baby girl; that we are, in fact, two grown – consenting - adults."

"One of whom is currently a cat," I reminded her with a meaningful look at my ring. "For a few minutes more, at least."

"Then I'd better get started," she said softly.

My masked eyes widened. "Mari—" I started.

Before I could say anything, she leaned up and kissed me very, very slowly, making my insides go all gooey. "I may or may not have told Papa that it would be in his best interests to leave us to our own devices tonight."

I was certain my heart was thumping hard enough to burst through my costume. "Milady," I said slowly, sure my masked eyes had gone wide, "are you saying what I _think_ you're saying?"

Marinette responded by gently tugging on my bell; while there was technically a zipper attached to it, I'd never actually used it. My feline eyes widened in shock at the metallic sound as Marinette ever-so-slowly started to expose more skin. "I always wondered what was under this," she said softly as she leaned up to plant a soft kiss on the recently revealed real estate.

Her eyes flicked back up at mine and she smiled wider. "Don't be so surprised, Kitty. The costume is what you want it to be, remember?"

I found I had to shift slightly to relieve some pressure. "I'll keep that in mind moving forward," I said quietly. "But it appears to give lie to what I told your Father."

Marinette lowered the zipper a bit further. "How will we _ever_ repay that sin of omission, I wonder?" she asked, each word blowing a warm breath against my skin. The act made me shudder involuntarily, and she laughed a little. "You are _far_ more sensitive than I expected."

"I'm still technically Chat," I reminded her. "Heighted awareness of... everything..." I said, taking a deep breath to attempt focus on something _other_ than the finger making tiny circles around a particularly sensitive portion of my chest, "comes with the deal. And while I admit to being ready... _very _ready-"

Marinette smiled. "I can tell," she smirked without missing a beat.

"-my, uh, _supplies, _shall we say, are back at the apartment." I rolled slightly to pull her closer. "We've not exactly discussed this yet, but I assume neither of us are ready for kittens at this stage in our careers."

Looking at me with those drop-dead gorgeous blue eyes, she nodded slightly. "Not yet," she replied as she slowly rolled away from me. "I may or may not have planned for this eventuality," she continued with a bit of a knowing grin as she slid off the chaise.

"That doesn't surprise me, Princess," I said softly as my masked eyes carefully watched her move gracefully away from me.

"Come hither, feline of my heart," Marinette beckoned.

As there was very little I could refuse Milady at this stage, I smoothly tumbled off of the chaise and stalked over to her on all fours, winding my tail around her hips as I slowly stood. Marinette was in front of the small bureau in the corner, atop which she'd stashed her purse earlier. I caught sight of my slightly bared chest in the mirror just behind, amazed again that my zipper, well, unzipped.

_Gonna have to ask Plagg what _else_ I can do, _I thought as Marinette opened her purse and started to dig.

After a moment, she turned toward me and deftly pulled me close; as she leaned up for a kiss, I felt her press something into my paw. "I've already done my part, Kitty," she whispered as she pulled back. "But like my best Lucky Charms, you have your own, very special role to play as well," Marinette added with a gleeful twinkle in her eyes.

My masked eyes wrinkled with the smile dancing across my lips. "Ladybug leaves nothing to chance," I observed with a sly smile.

"She does not," Marinette laughed as she pulled me toward her again for another, deeper kiss. Parting again, I could tell her breathing had grown a bit more pronounced – mirroring my own heightened respiration.

"Milady," I said a bit huskily, struggling to keep several competing feline instincts in line, "I won't lie. I've fantasized about this for… years." Given her height, she was able to slightly nibble at the edge of my collar as I tried to continue. "I have to admit, I never expected it would be here-"

I stifled a gasp as she continued to work her way along the edge of my collar and then exquisitely slowly planted one kiss after another as she retraced the path the bell had recently travelled. Each kiss sizzled like a bolt of electricity along my exposed skin, and I involuntarily threw my head back with a groan. Hastily, I wrapped my paws around the edge of the desk that she'd somehow managed to maneuver me against, gripping hard in an attempt to steady my rising emotions.

Marinette seemed intent on getting me to cross that line, though; I shuddered again at her gentle touch as she snuck a hand inside my costume, forcing me to squeeze my masked eyes shut as the sensations threated to overwhelm what little was left of my rational fur brain. "I… oh, boy… I _really_ need to detransform…" I warned her as I chanced to open my eyes again. "I'm not sure I can control-"

Marinette pressed a finger to my lips. "Kitty," she breathed, her breath warm against my Adam's apple, "for God's sake, please stop talking."

* * *

I would never have imagined her childhood bed would be big enough for two grown adults, but as I leaned on my arm, watching my partner sleep nestled into my chest, it occurred to me that being Miraculous holders had made us something close to professional gymnasts. Somehow, we'd performed more than a few moves in that small space impressive by any Cirque du Soleil standard – and that was _after_ my ring had chirped its final warning, releasing a grateful Plagg who quickly made himself scarce. I wasn't sure, but it looked a bit like Marinette was still smiling, possibly mirroring what I felt was a goofy grin I was wearing myself.

Carefully sliding the sheet over her bare shoulders, I shifted slightly to watch the stars through her skylight, still amazed we had finally reached this moment in our relationship. That it had happened at the Bakery seemed somewhat poetic, given how what I now viewed as my courtship of her had more or less taken place there; how many hours I had spent with her on that rooftop patio, I wasn't entirely sure. But every last one had led me directly to cuddling next to her in the wee hours of the morning.

Sighing, I knew we still had the whole Alya issue to deal with; and certainly, Hawkmoth was still out there, waiting, watching and plotting our downfall. We both needed what this night represented, though, as well as what it portended for our future together as a couple. I wasn't being hyperbolic when I'd told her I planned on marrying her; asking Marinette to share the rest of my life was very much top of mind, more so purrhaps after this special evening together. My scheduled had been dashed courtesy of my maybe-former friend, but maybe that was a good thing in the end.

I felt a Chat smile appear on my face as I turned to look at my slumbering princess. Valentine's Day was coming up, and as cheesy a character as I could be as Chat Noir, the beginnings of a plan were forming in my feline brain that would require my alter-ego extensively. For the moment, though, I was happy to snuggle back into my future spouse, curling around her and closing my eyes as I took in her perfume. It wasn't as strong or as exotically multi-layered for me as Adrien, but still firmly said _Marinette_ as I luxuriated in the closeness of her.

I may have even started to purr as I drifted off to sleep.


	36. Watchful Waiting

**Thirty-Six: Watchful Waiting**

_Author's Note: Chat, suspicious of Alya's recent behavior, embarks on a bit of a campaign to determine why she's acting so strangely, and lands himself in an unfathomable situation._

* * *

_Author's Warning: Please remember that the characters of Chat and Marinette as depicted in _Roommates_ are consenting adults who have graduated from University and are chronologically in their early twenties. Stated simply, they are grown-ups in a serious, loving relationship with each other. While this story remains firmly within the bounds of the Teen rating attached to it, there is plenty of innuendo within this chapter that readers who are uncomfortable with suggestive content may wish to avoid. No one will think any less of you for skipping to the next chapter. You can PM me and I'll give you the summary of what happened on the way to Chapter 37. ;-)_

* * *

My dreams alternated between Marinette and Ladybug, and left me with a pleasantly fuzzy feeling as I swam upward through the layers of slumber toward wakefulness. They had felt amazingly real, but the rational part of me – what rational part there _was_ in dreamland, that is – knew I'd simply put our actions of the prior evening on deep repeat. And I couldn't blame myself for that simple action, knowing as I did it had been the culmination of a dream years in the making. Except, as I started to think about it, one particular sensation felt a little _more_ real than a simple dream would otherwise allow…

Eyes snapping open, I was greeted with the vision of a smiling Marinette, a wicked gleam in her eyes. "Milady," I said breathlessly as a part of me involuntarily tensed. A slight panic likely showed on my face. "I'm not—"

"Got you covered, literally," she said softly. "You do sleep rather soundly, Kitty," she added after gently nipping at my nose.

There was no time for further talk as I gave myself over to her ministrations, growling lowly in the process. Returning the favor to my beloved afterward, we were well entangled in the sheets of her bed a short while later, facing each other. The slight sheen of sweat upon her face gave Marinette a glow I'd never seen before, and a portion of me had a hard time focusing on conversation. "That is one hell of a way to wake up someone," I observed with a smile.

"It seemed appropriate," she smiled. "Sadly, it's a workday. And as we only have one shower-"

I waggled my eyebrows. "I fail to see—"

"Save that thought," she laughed as she ran a hand through my messier-than-normal hair. "Damn."

I looked at her questioningly. "What?"

"I miss your feline ears. They are a natural part of you now. It's wrong not seeing them."

"Milady, I'm starting to wonder if you only love my costume."

I was rewarded with a pillow to the face.

We cycled through the small bathroom one after the other, though by necessity I had to transform back to Chat for the brief transit in case her parents caught me in the hallway. Less than forty minutes later, I appeared next to Marinette in the petite kitchen, where Sabine was pulling together breakfast for us. "Tom is down in the Bakery already," she smiled. "I've got fresh granola and hot oatmeal on the stove, Chat. Coffee is ready in the carafe, too."

"The elixir of life! Thank you, Madame," I said as I snagged a mug with a paw and poured out a healthy dose. "This is clawfully nice of you, given how we dropped in – literally – unannounced."

"I've gotten used to the unusual, given my daughter is dating a superhero." She smiled again as a mischievous look appeared – one I had seen many times on the face of her daughter. "I trust you slept well, Chat?"

I could feel the exposed portions of my face heat up. "Uh… actually… very well," I croaked, rooted to my spot.

"Good," she smiled wider. Leaning in to kiss Marinette, she turned back to us. "Marinette partially explained what's going on, and you are obviously welcome to stay as long as you like."

"Thanks," I said, "but we'll—"

"Get back to you," Mari answered, silencing me with a look.

I nodded tightly, face as hot as neutron star.

"Okay," she said, perplexed a bit. "I'm going down to help Tom."

"Breathe, Chat," Marinette teased as I stood beside her, clutching my coffee cup.

"She knows…" I mewled, looking at Marinette wild-eyed. "She knows what we—"

"Of course she does," Marinette replied as she sipped her coffee, acting for all the world as though we were simply discussing the day's news. "I wasn't exactly subtle with papa last night, if you recall."

I slid onto the barstool next to Marinette and started slowly thumping my feline head against the counter. "I can never come here again. I am literally drowning in embarrassment."

Patting me on the back of my unruly mane, I could hear Marinette trying very hard not to laugh. "It's a first for everyone involved, Chat."

"Drowning," I mewled again.

"Eat your breakfast," she advised.

I slunk back into the kitchen and made up some oatmeal and toast, my flaming face a clear beacon to anyone. Sitting back down beside her, though, I had enough presence of mind to pivot to another issue entirely. "Purrincess… I _am_ worried about Alya," I said between bites. "She's not acting like herself. At all."

Marinette nodded. "I've been thinking along the same lines. Her reaction to our conversation at the bar was not what I expected at all." She looked at me over the rim of her coffee cup. "What are you thinking?"

"I'm not sure yet," I said thoughtfully, my tail twitching. "But I do know we can't go to the apartment. She can track me if she transforms to Rena." I looked to Mari. "As much as I hate to impose on your parents, maybe another night or two here wouldn't hurt."

"I wouldn't mind it," Marinette smiled, that wicked gleam in her eyes once more.

The penny dropped. "Oh… my… kwami," I said, face flaming again. "Adrien… the Bakery…" I dropped my head to the counter. "This was _your_ fantasy, wasn't it?"

Marinette returned to her coffee, smiling wider. "You have no idea, Kitty."

* * *

Chat's Air Express dropped Marinette off at her office and then Adrien made a quick appearance at House of Gabriel, just long enough to snag a fresh set of clothing from my personal stash and check in on a few projects. I'd not been completely candid with my girlfriend earlier, for I _had_ concocted something of a plan – one that I was reasonably sure she'd not approve of. I agreed to meet her back at the Bakery after work, but neglected to tell her I'd cancelled all of my meetings in favor of returning to the rooftops of Paris, in pursuit of my latest prey.

My first stop was the rooftop of the television station Alya worked at; she was one of several journalists they employed, so I knew it would be just a matter of time before she appeared on her way to a story. I didn't have long to wait; about ten, she trotted down the steps of the old brick building and dashed for the Metro station across the street. That gave me pause, for despite having a vibrant online presence with the Ladyblog, she was actually an on-air reporter, and a camera crew was not with her. While it was entirely possible these days for her to record and edit an interview on her phone, it lacked the professional touch Parisians were used to.

_Curious_, I thought, my masked brow furrowing.

Not wanting to lose her, but also desiring to remain concealed, I waited until her head of recognizable hair had disappeared down the escalator to the station before I leapt off the building, looped around a lamppost one-pawed and landed atop the Metro sign. Another move and I was surfing down the slight space between the up and down escalators full of people, many of whom took it in stride that a human-sized cat was sailing past them.

I hit the bottom of the stairwell and vaulted into the safe darkness of the ceiling, snagging an exposed I-beam with a paw to hide atop so I could scan the crowd. Alya was standing in the crowd, seemingly oblivious to anything around her as she chatted excitedly on her phone. However, when I squinted a bit, my feline vision could see she was actually using the device as a prop, carefully watching the space as she "talked."

Frowning, I pressed myself into the shadows; that changed things, for it now forced me to make the assumption she'd seen me. Or, at the very least, Alya was expecting _someone_ to attempt to follow her. I thought about that for a moment, for maybe it wasn't Chat at all she was worried would be following her. While I did have a propensity for turning up at unusual times, it was highly unlikely Alya would even be expecting Chat at that hour of the day. Most of our interactions had been late afternoon or evening encounters, which meant _after_ work for her – supporting the idea that her Ladyblog efforts were on her own time.

I frowned further as I watched her eyes dart across the platform; they landed on a spot in the wall and then flicked away, but not before she started to deliberately move through the crowd toward it. Carefully, I paralleled her in the dark reaches of the ceiling, skulking across beams above her.

As the next subway train whooshed to a stop at the platform, Alya waited for the right moment and then pressed herself into a small alcove containing a door that I'd overlooked; faster than I could process, she tapped a code into the panel beside it. Using the crowd's surge toward the train to cover her disappearance, she slipped through as the door clicked open.

Not wanting the door to latch shut, I snapped my baton in half and hurled part of it at the closing door; it attached like a magnet to the threshold, forcing the door to stay slightly ajar. I dropped from the ceiling quickly, landing in a crouch beside the door and there I uncharacteristically hesitated; from the moment I'd entered the subway station, my level of uneasiness at the entire situation had done nothing except increase. Generally speaking, I was the part of the team that rushed in where angels fear to tread, so it was worth noting those alarm bells when they sounded in the back of my fur brain.

Standing slightly, I pressed a shoulder against the door – just enough to retrieve my baton piece and reassemble it. As I pressed further to peer into the space beyond, I was forced to change to my night vision as it was cloaked in total darkness. Pivoting an ear, I was reasonably certain I could tell which direction Alya had gone but was flummoxed at how quickly she had apparently moved to put distance between her and the platform.

My uneasiness grew exponentially.

Trying to be a smarter Chat, I slid my baton open and fired off a quick text message to Marinette. My experience with Copycat years ago remained an open wound, so I knew it would be prudent to work from the angle that Alya didn't necessarily have my best interests in mind. I waited until I got Mari's response, smiling slightly as my feline eyes flicked over the characters.

_That was expected,_ I laughed to myself as I quickly replied, then swapped over to the app screen on the baton. Having spent far too much time beneath the streets of Paris roaming the various sewers, catacombs and other creepy spaces, Plagg had thoughtfully added a new Breadcrumb Mode. It had saved my furry behind on more than one occasion, and I activated it as I pushed the door far enough open to slip through to the undiscovered country it protected.

Trying to hide my ingress, I carefully held the door handle in a paw as it glided shut behind me, grimacing slightly as the sound of the lock engaging rang out. It wasn't unexpected, but I did hear the footsteps in front of me pause a moment. I held my breath a beat or two and released it only when the steps continued once more. Glancing quickly behind me, I tried the door and I confirmed my suspicion that it had locked. Even without my night vision, I could clearly see a touchpad below a red LED light off to the side of the door and smiled, for I knew Plagg had also created a lockpicking app on the baton that had similarly proved useful over the years.

Baton in a paw, I kept to a defensive stance and pressed myself against the cold, clammy stone of the wall, then skulked as fast as stealth would allow, trailing the fuzzy night-vision form of my friend. She had a fifty-meter lead on me and I as pursued her, I found myself idly wondering what the Metro had used this space for in the past. My feline sense of smell was assaulted by dust and mold, telling me it hadn't been actively visited by anyone in years. The most likely explanation, given the narrow height and width, was as an accessway between sections of the line, and this proved true when Alya paused ahead of me after fifteen careful minutes of trailing her.

Holding my breath once more, I heard her punch a code into the door and then the lock snapped open; this time, she paused at the threshold, and I could clearly see her turn toward my direction in an attempt to look for a pursuer. Pressing myself back into the shadows, I narrowly avoided being caught in the beam from her phone's flashlight as she swept it from side-to-side, passing just in front of a boot.

Turning on heel, she slipped through the door and I vaulted toward it as quietly as I could, landing on my stomach and sliding toward it, paw outstretched. I managed to get a claw between the door and the threshold, just enough to keep it from fully latching. Quickly, I pulled it open and slipped through, repeating the process of gently allowing it to close behind me.

Pausing to get my bearings, we appeared to be in another station, but one that had not seen any sort of use in decades. One small light bar, hanging haphazardly at an angle, illuminated a tiny part of the platform, and caught the backside of Alya as she moved deliberately toward a darkened area of the far wall containing multiple sets of elevator doors. My masked eyebrows went up, for despite the fact the station was clearly abandoned, at least one of the elevators appeared to be active.

And descending from some level above.

Clearly, Alya was meeting someone, but from where I was standing, her form was blocking the doors to the elevator. I needed to get higher and scanned the space for ideas. There were few options, but the non-functional light bars hanging every few meters appeared to be the best of the lot, so I decided to repeat my earlier trick.

Leaping upward, I caught the first light bar in question and hauled myself over. It swayed uncomfortably below me, though, and perhaps most annoyingly, started to make a loud clanking noise as it oscillated. One that reverberated through the space.

Quickly, I pressed myself down against the top of the light, trying to be one with the metal and knowing it was futile. Alya flipped around and trained her flashlight on the ceiling and caught me dead to rights, for short of an earthquake, there was no reasonable explanation for why the fixture I was hiding above should be moving.

And Alya knew it.

"Chat!" she hissed as she scurried toward me. "You _can't_ be here!"

_That_ wasn't what I'd expected. "I could say the same—" I called out, reluctant to move.

"Damn it, there's no _time_! Get down here and I'll hide you. Hurry!"

Something in the way she said it gave me pause. I flicked a glance over to the elevators, and the indicator noted the carriage was but a few levels away. I took a shot in the dark. "I can help you," I said. "Let both of us help you."

"Get _down_ here! Now!" she cried out. "Hurry!"

I flipped off the light and landed in a crouch beside her. There wasn't much to work with, but there was a tarp covering something in a corner of the platform. Alya lifted an edge and motioned. "Get under here. I'll keep them away from this side, but you _have_ to remain quiet. Let me handle this."

"Alya—"

"_Now!_" she said as the signal for the elevator dinged. "Whatever you hear – whatever you _see_, stay put!" she added urgently.

One look at her face and I nodded, then I slipped under the tarp so she could cover me; I tried not to sneeze at the dust as I angled myself so I could crack a tiny part of the tarp open. Ironically, I wound up with a reasonably good line of sight, and I watched as Alya deliberately walked back to the elevator.

The doors slid open.


	37. Motivations, Revealed

**Thirty-Seven: Motivations, Revealed**

_Author's Note: Chat learns why Alya has been behaving out of character._

* * *

_Special note: I'm probably not alone in having life upended by the outbreak of the COVID-19 virus; these past ten days especially have been focused on ensuring the people I support professionally – not to mention my friends and family - are in a good place to deal with the dynamically changing situation we are facing. That greatly reduced the time available for writing, resulted in a rather truncated, but important, chapter for today._

_To be sure, this is a tough situation for all of us; in whatever small way I can bring some sense of normalcy to your day through my writing, I will continue to update my stories on my normal schedule as best as I can. That may mean shorter chapters than normal – or not, but either way, I promise to continue as we work our way through this crisis. __-ep_

* * *

"I've done everything you asked," Alya told the figure within the elevator. "Now, please—"

"Not everything," a female voice said from inside the carriage.

I squinted, but even my superior feline vision was unable to pierce the strategically placed lamps inside the carriage that were backlighting whoever Alya was talking to. And yet, the voice seemed awfully familiar. Torn between needing to know and wanting to protect my friend, I stayed put and strained all of my enhanced senses to their limit in an attempt to hear every word.

"Please," Alya pleaded. "I can't keep going like this. They're my friends!"

There was a pause, and then a rather bloodcurdling scream from Alya; I nearly came out from under the tarp as I watched her fall to her knees, clutching at her wrist. Her sleeve had fallen away, exposing an unusual looking bracelet I'd never noticed before. The way it was glowing white, though, told me it was not of the normal jewelry variety.

Slowly, the light faded as did Alya's choked cries. And, to my surprise, so did the bracelet. I blinked multiple times to confirm it had cloaked itself against the skin of my friend's wrist, explaining how I had missed it earlier.

_Magic? Check_, I thought.

I fought every instinct to leap out there; instead, I slid a hand to my baton and slipped it forward, training the camera on the elevator as I hit the video recording function.

The figure in the elevator remained aloof, however, choosing to stay inside the confines of the space. "Until you complete your task to my satisfaction, you will not be released. Nor will your fiancé."

My masked eyes shot wide. _That explains Alya's motivations. Especially if somehow Nino is in danger, too._

"Your excellency," she was saying desperately, "it's exceedingly difficult to turn Paris against them. You saw how they handled the photos! If anything, they are held in _better_ standing now than before!"

"There will be another opportunity this evening. You'll receive the text at the appropriate time. Be ready."

"What sort of opp—"

She screamed again.

"You forget your place. No questions," the voice said as the doors to the elevator slid shut.

I barely waited for the indicator to go out before throwing the tarp off and leaping to Alya's side. She was curled into a fetal position, shaking and whimpering.

"I've got you," I said as I held her. "And I'll get you out someplace safe—"

"No!" Alya said harshly through gritted teeth. "She… can track… me."

My feline eyes went to her wrist. "All right. Home, then?"

She nodded. "I'll be fine… in a few minutes," she breathed. "I'm over… the worst of… it."

I smiled grimly as I hugged her. "Yes, I think you are."


	38. Saving Friends

**Thirty-Eight: Saving Friends**

_Author's Note: Now that Chat understands what's going on with his friend, __he and Ladybug begin to take steps to correct the situation._

* * *

Alya shared an apartment with her fiancé one arrondissiment over from our place, and we found it dark and empty upon arrival. Under normal circumstances, I wouldn't have expected to find Nino at home in the middle of the day but based on what I'd overheard in the abandoned subway station, I suspected there was a more nefarious reason for his absence.

Mostly recovered from her experience, Alya had opted to transform so we could cross the city faster; I landed just behind the fox on a nondescript balcony fronting the street and did a quick check to ensure we'd not attracted any undue attention before the two of us slipped into the main space of the apartment together. For the first time in a while, it felt like the Rena of old — my witnessing of events in the subway had lifted a weight from her slender shoulders. It was nice having some semblance my friend, and I therefore didn't object when she asked if I minded that she stay transformed.

"It helps a bit," she admitted. "I'm not exactly sure how. The suit seems to protect me."

"I'm not surprised," I said as I perched on the back of her couch. My tail swished slightly as I looked across to where she was pacing by the window. "Ladybug is on her way," I said gently. "Have a seat, would you? You're making me nervous."

She looked at me and slowly moved to a recliner that seemed more something Nino would have preferred, given the beer-sized cup holders in each arm and the scattered game controllers on the end table.

"Chat," she started as she held her tail out of the way so she could sit down. "Look—"

I suspected I knew where she was going and held up a paw. "Rena, you and Cap are the closest thing I have to family. You don't have to say anything. We'll get through this. Together."

"But Chat," Rena continued, and I could see tears brimming at the corner of her masked eyes, "I'm so sorry. I'm in way over my head here," she continued, grimacing in pain as she ground out the words. My masked feline eyes snapped to her wrist, amazed to see the slight outline of the bracelet glowing against her costume. "I've hurt you and Mari—"

I leapt to her side and pressed a claw tip to her lips. "Hush, Rena," I said softly, eyes darting to the bracelet and then back to her glistening eyes. "Let's think about happier times, shall we?"

She nodded mutely.

"Please tell me you have wine," I said as I vaulted toward her kitchen. "Because I could really use a drink right now."

Rena chuckled – a welcome sound that I think both Mari and I had missed. "Chat, it's not even noontime."

"I'm in Paris," I countered, "and I've just discovered dear friends of mine are in danger. I think that qualifies."

"Upper cabinet," Rena laughed. "Glasses are underneath."

I was in the middle of uncorking the bottle I'd located with a claw tip when a feline ear twisted; I looked up and caught the bemused face of Ladybug as she stepped through the doors from the patio, arched masked eyebrow telling me how she felt about my transgression. I smiled widely as I decanted into three wineglasses. "Purrfect timing as always, Milady."

"Rena," Ladybug said as she took up position on the couch and accepted a glass from me.

Rena's face had paled slightly at the appearance of Ladybug, and she became more reserved. "I'd understand if you took the Miraculous away," she said softly. "I've been actively working against you."

Ladybug leaned forward and took Rena's gloved hand into her own. "Why don't you start from the beginning?" She asked gently. "Then we'll go from there."

"I'm not sure about that," I interjected. "Rena, correct me if I'm wrong, but that bangle of yours acts up if you go off the rails, right?"

Rena nodded, and at the same time the bracelet lit up again.

Ladybug's eyes went wide. "Even transformed?"

"That shocked me too," I replied as I sipped from my glass. "It's almost like it's monitoring her every move, her every action."

"And… thoughts…" Rena nodded haltingly again. "Sleep is… the only… time!"

Rena gasped and dropped her wineglass as her gloved hands shot to her head, the bracelet glowing brightly; my fast feline reflexes let me dart in quickly to catch her falling wineglass in my free paw as I slid beneath her chair. Coasting to a stop on my side with two wineglasses now, I thoughtfully tapped a claw against one glass.

"Nice catch," Ladybug said.

"Thanks," I replied and then twisted my mane to look up at Rena. "You have to be awake for it to control you? Just nod if that's the case."

Rena nodded as she tried to catch her breath.

"We need a way to fake it out then, don't we," I murmured before looking to Ladybug. "Some method to relax Rena _just_ enough that the bracelet thinks she's sleeping, but not enough that she can't speak more freely to us." I looked back at the wineglasses in my paws and smiled wryly. "Wine _might_ work, but…"

"Actually, Chat, you're on to something," Ladybug nodded, a smile playing at her lips. "And I think I know what will do the trick. I'll be right back."

* * *

The only downside to Ladybug's plan was how it affected me.

Returning less than fifteen minutes after her abrupt departure, I immediately recognized the vial Marinette had received as a gag gift at Christmas from her officemates. Curious cat that I was, I'd discovered it by accident one evening, and Mari had consequently found a very pliant kitty lounging on the kitchen counter infatuated with the argument taking place in the apartment above us. Looking from the vial to her masked blue eyes, I arched a masked eyebrow.

"Seriously?" I mewled.

"I don't know if it will work," she said honestly, "but seeing her transformed gave me the idea."

"Milady," I said quietly, "she's a fox. Those pheromones were meant for a _cat_."

"True," she smiled, "but I have a hunch it will work."

My masked eyes widened. "But it will affect _me_, too," I warned her. "If she reacts poorly to it, I might not be capable of protecting you."

Ladybug looked at Rena. "I think she'll be fine," she said slowly.

I pulled Ladybug aside and whispered, urgently, "LB, are you _sure_ about that? She's not completely in charge of herself. We have zero idea of what she might do."

Ladybug looked over my shoulder. "I am," she replied firmly in a tone that I knew from long experience brooked no argument.

"As you wish, Milady," I replied and stepped away.

Ladybug uncorked the bottle and then brought it close to Rena. "Take a deep whiff," she said, "and then relax."

"Milady-" I started, intending to remind Ladybug that Rena's sense of smell was as enhanced as my own – that there was no need for her to get so close to the fox. But the exotic scent quickly hit my feline olfactory, and as I shook my mane in a poor attempt to try and keep my wits about me, I quite suddenly didn't care one way or the other.

I blinked and found I was on my side down on the carpet, purring loudly and looking between Ladybug and Rena. For some reason, even though the back of my feline brain was telling me there was an emergency, the rest of me felt pleasantly comfortable. And for whatever reason, I was enthralled by the way Ladybug's costume was shimmering in the low light of the apartment. I'd never noticed that the pattern of small hexagonal shapes were so evenly distributed between the red and black portions-

I shook my head violently, trying to clear my wandering mind. _I hope this works_, I thought. _Because I'm not going to be worth much in a few short minutes._

"Okay Rena," Ladybug said slowly (at least, I think it was slowly, for my sense of time seemed to be paused), "start from the top."

I languidly turned my mane toward Rena, who I had to admit certainly looked as comfortable as I was feeling. She smiled slightly. "Nino and I were in the craft festival a month ago," she said a bit dreamily.

_I'd been there too,_ I thought. _Trying to find a ring for Marinette. It was at-_

"The one at Trocadero?"

"Yeah," Rena said, nodding deeply enough that her ears tilted forward. Funny, I'd never noticed that she had the same hexagonal patterns as the two of us in her costume. "There were so many vendors, but Nino and I happened on one small booth."

I glanced at her wrist, fascinated by the fact the bracelet was glowing, but just barely.

"That particular artisan had a variety of hand-made jewelry," Rena continued, and even in my excessively relaxed state, I could still hear Rena's heartbeat had ticked up as she told her story. "When she saw the two of us, she smiled and showed us the most beautiful set of what she called 'lover's bracelets.' They are mirrors of each other, done in gold and silver."

"Sounds pretty."

Rena smiled. "They were," she sighed. "And then we made the mistake of trying them on." Her expression faltered quite a bit, commensurate with another uptick in her heartrate. I sluggishly turned to say something to Ladybug, but she was already on top of it, wafting the vial past Rena again. The light dimmed just a bit on her bracelet as Rena took a deep breath and started to relax once more.

"You put them on," Ladybug prompted after waiting for Rena to settle back.

"Yeah," Rena continued. "It slipped on easily, and... and..."

Despite the second dosing, just talking about the bracelet shot Rena's heartrate upward fast enough that a bolt of adrenaline washed away my torpor. "Milady," I said urgently.

"I see it," Ladybug nodded. "I don't dare do more," she said softly.

Rena waved her away, and gritting her teeth, continued. "The bracelet immediately lit up. It glowed! And we both knew in an instant something was wrong, but I couldn't get it off, nor could Nino. And then… and then…" Rena started to shake.

"What happened, Rena?" Ladybug asked gently. "Go slow. Walk me through it."

"Voice… in my head," Rena said haltingly. "I… had no choice! Trying to disobey was… painful," she managed to get out, her chest heaving at the effort of trying to speak. My eyes flicked to the bracelet again and saw it was glowing brighter than ever; looking back to Rena, I was more than impressed at how much obvious effort it was taking to work against the control the bracelet was attempting to assert. The pheromones had helped, to a point; the rest was all Rena.

"Ladybug…" I warned; the burst of adrenaline had waned leaving me once more with a detached feeling, but even so, I knew that Rena was on the edge. "Careful."

She patted me on the mane and nodded, then changed tacts. "Where is Nino, Rena?"

The fox's eyes snapped wide open, and darted between my eyes and Ladybug. "Home," she said, the word a low, guttural whisper.

Ladybug's eyes widened. "He's not here, Rena."

"_Home_," Rena said again. "Can't be… within… fifty! Meters! Without hurting… him!" Rena screamed, the bracelet glowing white hot against the brown of her costume.

Ladybug moved around and cradled Rena. "Okay, okay, that's good for now," she said softly, rocking her friend gently. "We more or less can guess the rest."

My girlfriend's beautiful eyes looked over to me, full of worry and concern. "It doesn't sound like Hawkmoth, does it?"

I just smiled back at her. She really was quite lovely.

"If it's an akuma, it's not like any we've ever faced before. This one has been in action for weeks." She continued to rock Rena. "I wish we'd gotten a look at whoever it was that sold them the bracelets."

"I have a video," I said suddenly, oddly proud that I had remembered it. "It'll help fill in the blanks."

"I'm sure you do, kitty," she smiled as she corked the vial. "Let's clear the air a bit, and then check it out."


	39. Ch-Ch-Changes

**Thirty-Nine: Ch-Ch-Changes**

_Author's Note: While it's still unclear who the new villain is and what their exact motivations might be, Ladybug and Chat decide the first order of business is removing Alya and Nino from the duress they are under._

* * *

"I didn't feel this way the last time," I mewled, my forehead pressed against the cool of the kitchen tile, paws pressed to each temple.

We'd spent the afternoon with Alya, but even after going against her better judgement and uncorking the pheromones once more, Ladybug hadn't been able to procure any additional information from our teammate aside from confirming that Nino was holed up at his parent's house. Hours of exposure to the vial, however, had one positive effect: we'd managed to get Alya tucked into bed and had left her sleeping very soundly just a bit before the dinner hour.

For me, however, the bonus time exposed to the pheromones had affected more significantly than I would have expected. Despite every bone in my feline body wanting to check in on my best friend, I was in no shape at all to travel across the city and face what might be waiting for us; Ladybug had prudently decided to regroup instead.

What little wits I had left at that point had required Ladybug to lead me back to our apartment; de-transforming, Marinette had begun plying me with black coffee to try and chase away the effects of the pheromones. The efforts, though, had left me with a monster headache and a desire to rip whoever had done this to our friends limb-from-limb. Cognizant of what had been said to Alya in the subway, however, both Mari and I knew we had to be prepared for a move from our new nemesis that evening.

Just thinking about it made me growl. There was also an odd feeling deep inside me, one that I'd never felt before and couldn't quite quantify. I growled again as I thanked the kwamis for having picked an apartment with granite countertops.

Marinette gently pressed a hand to my mane. "You're reacting more like it was catnip," she said thoughtfully. "And yet you were exposed for a shorter period of time."

I groaned, knowing what was about to come.

"You've certainly clocked more time transformed as Chat since then, too," she continued as she slid around to sit on the stool beside me.

"I know, I know," I mewled again, my tail slashing back and forth. "I spend too much time as Chat. You've told me before-"

"Before you drown in your pity," Marinette laughed softly, "I was actually going in a different direction."

Twisting my masked visage slightly, I cracked open a masked eye. "You aren't going to harangue me about staying transformed?"

"Of course I am," she smiled. "But-later."

Huffing, I turned my head back. She wasn't wrong, up until I'd finally revealed I was Adrien, I'd spent nearly every hour with her transformed as Chat. "Then what,? I asked morosely, trying to ignore the pounding in my head.

"You remember all of those times that Hawkmoth has taunted us with the notion that we don't command our full suite of powers?" she asked softly.

I twisted again to stare at her. "Yes. I still recall what Bunnix from-the-future was able to do that one time she visited us. As well as how embarrassed I was that I had to recharge in front of her."

Something passed across Mari's face, and it made me look up fully. "You've seen her again?"

Marinette looked away, an act I knew from long experience telegraphed her unease.

I sat up. "When? Recently?" I asked, ignoring the wave of nausea either the rapid movement had triggered or the very thought that Future Bunnix had made another appearance. Her last visit had opened us to the possibility that the "correct" future could be harmed by Hawkmoth's actions, something that filled me with deep dread. And intensified the throbbing of my headache in the process.

"Not recently, no." She turned back and smiled weakly. "It was years ago."

I watched her eyes and saw something in them that I'd never seen before: fear.

"Milady, I don't recall more than the one visit." My tail swished again. "Where was I?" I asked.

"Blissfully unaware," she replied, tapping me on my feline nose.

"Mari," I softly pressed. "_What happened_?"

"Nothing," she said, looking away again. "Thankfully."

"Did she-"

"I'd prefer not to talk about it right now," she said, turning toward me and using her patented brook-no-dissent Ladybug tone. "We have bigger fish to fry at the moment."

I glared at her, for it had been quite some time since she'd pulled that particular stunt on me. Normally it would be enough for me to cease and desist, but a low growl of disagreement escaped before I could stop it.

Softening her gaze, she pressed a hand to my masked face. "I promise we'll talk about it. But it has to wait until _after_ we get Alya out of her mess."

Ire abating slightly, I put my paw to her hand and nodded slowly. "I'm going to hold you to that," I warned.

"I'd expect nothing less, Kitty. Now," she said as she pulled her teacup over to me. "Cataclysm this, please."

I looked between the teacup and my girlfriend. "I know I still have cotton in my fur brain, but... do _what_?"

"Cataclysm this."

Arching a masked eyebrow, I nonetheless raised my ring hand. "Cataclysm!" I cried.

As well-used to the intoxicating feel of the power of destruction flowing into my hand as I was, I could tell immediately that something was a bit different. Holding my hand out in front of me, I found myself momentarily mesmerized by the snapping, crackling energy. Even that, too, looked and felt different. I turned to Marinette. "Those pheromones have done something to me," I said to her, a note of caution in my voice. "Something is wrong."

"No, Chat," Marinette said, smiling slightly. "I think something is _right_. Take out the teacup, please."

I looked at her again, but slowly brushed my paw across the teacup. Immediately, it turned to ash and drifted away. "You loved that cup," I said as I turned up my ring hand.

"Not that one," she said.

"Oh," I said.

She stood and went to the cabinet, pulling out a second teacup. "Okay, cataclysm this, please."

"I'll have to recharge," I said, though my eyes were planted on my ring.

"Trust me," she said. "Try it."

"Cataclysm?" I said a bit tentatively.

To my surprise, the rush of energy flowed to my paw once more. I held it out again, staring at it in wonder before I turned to Marinette with a half-smile on my face. "This is new."

"I've suspected we were both getting close to transitioning into our full adult powers," Marinette said as she watched me turn her second cup into a pile of ash. "While Master Fu couldn't give a specific date, of course, he did say length-of-time transformed played a big role in the holder's body adjusting to handle the greater powers." She smiled at me a bit wider. "I'm not surprised you've unlocked this achievement, as it were, given as much time you spend as Chat."

I nodded. "Especially the past seven months."

"Exactly. So in this case, it seems to have helped, not hurt."

That undefinable feeling deep inside suddenly made sense. I nodded again. "I can feel it, actually. And though I can't explain it, I've got this... sense... there are some new tricks inside this old feline." I paused. "How do I use them? What are they?"

Mari shrugged. "I don't know. The Grimoire might have more information. Once this is over, we'll need to visit with Master Fu, I think."

"Defelinely."

I looked at my ring again, and smiled to see that all of the pads were still lit. "I could get used to this."

"Don't get _too_ excited," she warned. "I suspect you have some limits, still. But to be honest, it's good to know we have this ace up our sleeve. I think we could use every advantage we can get right now."

"Can you-"

"No," she frowned. "But I think I am close." Marinette came back around the desk and grabbed my baton from the small of my back as she passed by. "You said you had a video?" she asked as she held it out to me.

"Yes," I said as I accepted the baton from her and snapped it open. "I don't think it's going to give us a clear shot of who Alya was speaking to, but you'll hear what I heard as well."

Queuing up the video, I glanced one last time at my ring before hitting play. The small screen jumped and gave a partial view of the elevator from beneath the tarp; as I suspected, I'd been blocked from getting a clear shot of the interior of the elevator.

The sound, however, was crystal clear, and once more I felt that I knew the voice we were hearing. It was familiar yet different, almost in the same way my voice as Chat was similar to Adrien, but not exactly the same. "Do you recognize her?" I asked Marinette after we re-ran the video a third time.

Mari had a thoughtful expression on her face. "Maybe," she said after a long, long pause. "I agree, it's someone we know. And they are transformed."

My masked eyes widened. "Wait, _transformed_? You don't think this is an akuma?"

"No," she said again, her eyes turning toward me. "I think this is another holder."

That caused my feline ears to shoot straight up. "I wasn't aware that Master Fu was missing anything other than the Peacock and the Moth," I said. "And all of the other jewels are accounted for, right?"

"The ones we know about," she replied. "We've got another reason to talk to the Guardian now."

I switched to phone mode and glanced at the time on my baton. "I'd prefer to see what we can do about Nino and Alya first," I said, looking up with a grin. "How do you think those bracelets of theirs would handle my Cataclysm?"

Marinette smiled slightly. "Not well, I suspect. Let's go see if we have a volunteer willing to assist us in our research. Tikki – spots on!"


	40. Chains Broken

**Forty: Chains Broken**

_Author's Note: Chat takes his new powers for a test drive, trying to free Nino and Alya from their cursed bracelets._

* * *

Plagg floated above the bathroom counter, a smug expression on his tiny face. "I figured you were close," he said as he popped another slice of Camembert into his mouth.

"You could have warned me," I said as I toweled my hair. Marinette had rightly recommended a cold shower to chase the final effects of the pheromones away; my head felt clear for the first time in hours. The brief interlude had also allowed me a few moments with Plagg to discuss my new reality.

He smirked a bit. "Are you honestly going to tell me you hadn't noticed the changes?"

Hanging the towel on the rack, I finger styled my hair and pondered whether it was worth gelling it. "What changes?"

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the kwami roll his eyes. "Please. Leaping higher? Running longer? The lag between using your Cataclysm and the first pad winking out on the ring?"

I'd grabbed the bottle of gel but paused mid-squeeze of the viscous material. It _had_ occurred to me the five-minute timer that had ruled my world since becoming Chat Noir seemed to be more on the order of six or seven minutes; such a subtle shift, though, hadn't meant much. Combine that, though, with the upgraded physicality, and I knew the tiny God of Destruction was right.

As I stared at my reflection in the mirror, it dawned on me I'd felt a wave of such changes once before. My version of puberty, though, had come with some distinctly feline traits that had been rather difficult to control. A slight smile appeared on my doppelgänger as I recalled one particular afternoon where I'd nearly gone feline-a-mano with Luka Couffaine over the love of Marinette.

Maybe it had been a result of those challenging times that had caused me to ignore the most recent changes. I'd made it through the teenage version, so perhaps my fear of this adult version was misplaced. Then again, while I had long wielded a terrible power for the good of society, deep down in my soul I realized I was now many magnitudes more powerful than even I had ever imagined. Holding my ring hand up, I decided that fear was well founded.

"Holy kwami," I breathed before shifting my gaze to Plagg. "What else can I do?"

"Plenty of things," he said as he unwrapped another slice from the small wheel I'd carried in for him. "Once you're done blasting this other holder out of the water, we'll talk."

I started to run the gel through my hair, creating the look that graced hundreds of billboards across Paris. "So it is a holder, then?"

"Yeah. Based on how you've described it, Sugar Cube and I think it might be from another Miracle Box. It's definitely not a kwami from our group."

My hand stopped midway through the air. "Wait. What? _Another_ Miracle Box?"

"Master Fu can explain everything when you see him," Plagg said. "But yes, there are lots of other boxes out there. At least, there used to be – until today, I would have told you all of them had been lost, save for the one the Guardian has."

I turned toward him. "And you're telling me this only now because...?"

Plagg gobbled another piece of cheese and looked as contrite as was possible for him. "They've been missing for centuries," he said after swallowing. "And it's not my story to tell."

"Indeed," I frowned as I finished up and washed the excess gel off my hands. "We'll have a nice, long chat about being forthright with your holder when this is all over."

Plagg simply nodded and allowed me to transform back to Chat Noir; a few minutes later, I joined Ladybug in the skies of Paris, working our way toward Nino's hideout. "Did you get through to Alya?"

"Yes," Ladybug replied as we ran side-by-side along the spine of a building. "The pheromones let her sleep more than she's gotten in a few weeks – and she's not been summoned yet."

"Good," I nodded as I leapt over an alleyway, tail snapping as I soared into the space. "That gives us a bit more time."

"Yes," she agreed. "And a slight advantage. She's transformed to Rena and will be waiting on the rooftop."

"Will that be far enough away?" I asked as I vaulted into a tuck over a chimney. We'd decided that based on what little we knew about the bracelets, removing one would likely notify our nemesis of our actions; worse, it was likely it would ratchet the pain up to new levels on the remaining bracelet in retribution. Our plan was to try and remove them one after the other – if that was possible.

"That's the hope," she said.

"Do you really think this will work?" I asked. "I've done targeted Cataclysm's before, but never on an item that is, essentially, embedded on someone."

"I do," she said as she tossed a smile at me. "Mostly because I have unwavering confidence in the cool cat who will be wielding it."

"I'm going to need it," I laughed as we leapt in tandem one last time, landing on a balcony I'd not been on for some time. The space beyond the French doors was dark, so my night vision kicked in and allowed me to see the figure of my friend curled into a fetal position on the small couch.

The door was unlocked, and I pulled it open; I slipped into the room with Ladybug right behind me, both of us on edge. My feline senses told me Nino was alone, but in truth we had no real idea of the breadth and depth of powers this holder might possess. Dropping down to the side of the couch, I placed a paw on Nino's arm.

He rolled toward me, and looked terrible. Nino hadn't shaved in days, and my feline nose wrinkled in confirmation that it had been at least that long since he'd graced a shower. His clothes were wrinkled and rumpled, food stained and slept in. "Chat..." he said, his voice hoarse.

"Hey," I said. "We're here."

"Alya?" he croaked. At the mere mention of his fiancé, a glow from beneath the arm of his shirt appeared, and his brow furrowed.

My masked eyes widened and then narrowed as I turned toward Ladybug. "When I get my claws on-" I growled.

"Down, kitty," Ladybug said, but I could hear her anger clearly. Using love as a weapon was a first, and possibly the cruelest thing I'd ever seen.

She shifted to slide next to me and rolled the cuff up to expose the glowing outline of the bracelet. "As much as I hate to say this, it might be easier for you to do your thing while it's visible."

I swallowed. "Right," I said as I held up my ring hang. Taking a deep breath, I said, softly: "Cataclysm."

The power of destruction flowed into my hand and paused for a moment. I shifted my masked eyes to Ladybug again, hesitant for the first time in years.

"Go ahead," she said softly. "This _will_ work."

I took another deep breath, and then very carefully tapped a claw against the rapidly fading bracelet. Like water wicking into a dry piece of cloth, the band encircling Nino's wrist quickly shifted colors and became a robust rusty brown. To my surprise, that's as far as it went. As it started to shift back to the white-hot glow, I realized what I needed to do.

"Cataclysm!" I cried and tapped it again with a claw. Then again. And again.

Each touch of my claw to the bracelet seemed to hurt Nino; my feline ears went flat, but I pressed onward, trying to ignore his struggles to get away from me. At one point, Ladybug had to hold him in a massive hug, gently stroking his sweat-matted hair in an effort to comfort him.

Again, and again, and again I tapped at his bracelet, trying unsuccessfully to close my emotions down.

I lost track of how many times I had to call on my superpower, but when the bracelet finally shifted one last time and fluttered away as traces of ash, I felt as spent as I'd ever been. Crumpling to the carpet below the couch, I was breathing hard and wanted nothing more than to curl up into a tiny ball and sleep for a month.

Ladybug moved above me and then I felt her next to me.

"How is he?" I asked.

"Sleeping peacefully," she said. "That took more than I expected."

"It did," I replied as I opened my masked eyes. Holding up my ring hand, I could see I'd lost a paw print. "Plagg is gonna want a full buffet, I think."

"No kidding."

The howl of intense pain filtered down from the roof, and we knew in an instant we had been correct. "Will he be okay?" I asked as I laboriously pulled myself up from the carpet. "Can we safely leave him for a few minutes?"

Cries of anguish cut Ladybug's response short. "We don't have a choice," she said as she went for the door. "Come on!"

I felt sluggish as I vaulted through the door and clawed up the side of the building before leaping over the edge of the roof. Rena was curled into a tiny ball, just as Nino had been, howling in pain much as her namesake animal might have done if caught in a hunter's snare. Quickly dropping to her side, I prayed I still had enough left in the tank. "Cataclysm!" I cried as Ladybug quickly held out Rena's arm.

The power flowed into my hand once more, and I gently tapped my claw tip to the white glow visible through her costume. Much as with Nino, it took multiple hits to get it to change color; hearing Rena scream and feeling her struggles against me were no easier to handle than they had been with Nino, but at that point I could only, grimly, press on.

This time, though, every four Cataclysms resulted in another pad winking out on my ring. I began to despair that I might be putting Rena through this excruciating action only to not be able to finish the job. By the time it finally shifted to ash, I was down to my final pad on the ring, which was chirping at me furiously.

For my own part, I felt like I had just run two marathons, back to back. In some ways I probably had. Collapsing against the cold tile of the roof, I knew I only had seconds before I lost my transformation – and exposed another secret. "Ladybug, I've got to recharge," I said.

"I've got her," Ladybug said. "She's passed out, anyway."

I nodded, unable to really do more, then painfully managed to pull myself up and crawl around behind the skylight we'd braced Rena against. I'd barely leaned against it myself when my transformation sizzled away and an exhausted Plagg fell into my hands. "I didn't expect you to try it out quite that fast," he wheezed. "Cheese..."

Fumbling through my shirt, I came up with several slices that he downed in rapid succession. I was reaching into my pants for the emergency slice when Ladybug called out. "Chat?"

"Recovering," I said. "I'll be around in a moment."

"Good," she said, though I caught something in her voice.

"What?" I asked pointedly.

"Rena received her next assignment just before we removed Nino's bracelet; she left her text messages open for us in case she passed out."

"Lovely. What is it?"

"The place is probably more significant," she said. "She's supposed to lure us to the Grevin."

I blinked. "The Grevin," I said slowly, nodding as I did. "That explains everything."

"It does," Ladybug replied and I knew from her tone she'd figured it out too.

"Well, let me finish plying my kwami with food. We wouldn't want to be late for our own funeral, now would we?"

"Indeed not," she chuckled.


	41. Old Acquaintance, New Nemesis

**Forty-One: Old Acquaintance, New Nemesis**

_Author's Note: A connection to a past akuma attack becomes apparent as Chat and Ladybug confront the mysterious force Alya and Nino had been contending with._

_(__I am so sorry at the late posting! Life interfered with my schedule, but hopefully I've still caught the worst grammar errors. And yes, this is a cliffhanger. Sorry (not sorry). -ep)_

* * *

The Musée Grévin.

Just the name raised the fur along my spine and added to the low burn of fury that had been simmering in my feline soul since discovering the true nature of Alya's actions. I had avoided the world-famous museum as much as was possible, given I was also one of the most popular wax figures on display there. They had recast my wax doppelgänger multiple times over the years, allowing it to keep up with my own physical changes; Chat Noir was still part of the Hero's Corridor, but he appeared to be frozen in time, alongside the ageless Ladybug.

I had tried over the years to forget the akuma attack we'd fought off at the museum, for while we'd been successful at turning back Hawkmoth that day, I'd played a prank on Marinette that quite nearly derailed our friendship. We'd obviously gotten beyond that, but seeing the building appear on the horizon conjured up a barrage of emotions that I didn't really want to deal with at that moment.

So, naturally, I tried to bury it beneath a veneer of pure Chat. It turned out to be harder than I thought when I let out a menacing growl as I closed in on my prey.

"It's okay, Kitty," Ladybug said as we landed side-by-side on an adjacent rooftop. Seeming to read my mind and emotions much as she always could, she put a gloved hand to my costumed shoulder. "What happened here was a long, long time ago now – and we're stronger now as a result. You know that deep down inside that feline heart of yours."

I nodded. "It doesn't mean I don't still feel terrible about it," I said softly. "Not one of my finer moments."

"Chat, we were kids at the time, barely a year into being superheroes. I think you can finally cut yourself some slack – you've more than made up for whatever you think you did back then."

Ladybug was right; both of us had grown as a result of our outing that day so long ago. Nodding my shagging mane, I tried to paper over my emotions with some humor and trained my half-sly Chat smile on her. "Of course, I'm _far_ more handsome now."

She rolled her eyes. "Come on, let's get this over with."

I leapt up and helicoptered over to the ornate roof of the museum; Ladybug followed on her yo-yo, landing nearly silently beside me. "Normally I would suggest splitting up, but I'm a little concerned that might be part of their master plan."

"Agreed," she nodded. "Especially since there are copies of us down there - though come to think of it, they've not updated that exhibit, have they?"

"No," I smiled. "I was thinking about that when we arrived. It's us as teens." I looked up with a smile. "I wouldn't blame you if you can't tell me apart from younger me. But there is a more recent version of Adrien down there."

"There is, isn't there?" Ladybug said thoughtfully.

I saw that Ladybug had that look she got when her Lucky Vision was kicking in and arched an eyebrow. "This is going to be interesting," I said.

"Yeah," she murmured with a growing smile. "It is." She turned to me. "I need you to de-transform."

I blinked, and felt my ears go straight up in shock. "Say what?"

"How long ago did you get re-cast for your wax figure?" she asked instead.

"About a month, I guess," I replied. "It takes a bit for them to get it painted but I'd assume it's on the floor now."

"Good," she smiled. "Maybe that little stunt you pulled on me will prove to be useful now."

"Milady, I have a feline I'm not going to like this."

"You're not," she replied with a kiss. "Now, de-transform."

Despite my absolute faith in Ladybug, I was a little reluctant to leave her without the benefit of my support. Fixing her with my masked feline eyes, I said very quietly: "Plagg – claws in."

Plagg appeared as the glow faded, took one look at the intensity on Ladybug's face and had the good sense to bite his tongue and instead slip inside my shirt.

"Good," she said. "It would have been better if you'd somehow worn the same outfit they have on you down there, but this will work."

"Okay," I said as she led me over to a skylight; peering over the edge, I could see we were just above the statuary hall, a massive room of pillars where famous personalities were scattered across the marble tile. "I know you have a plan, or are creating one, but do you want to clue me in a bit here?" I asked. "I feel a bit naked without my costume."

Despite the situation, Ladybug giggled. "Do you now," she said as she tried and failed to stop smiling. "I'm reasonably certain we've lost the element of surprise," she explained as she carefully lifted open the skylight. "This might help me get some of it back."

"Okay," I said, trying and failing to give her my standard Chat skeptical glare.

"Time to go fishing…" she said as she unwound her yo-yo. "Stand back."

I took a step away from the skylight and watched with bemusement as she tossed her yo-yo into the space below. Hooking something, she slowly started to reel her catch back up, grunting slightly at the weight.

"I'd help, but you asked me to drop my transformation," I smiled as I folded my arms and leaned against the opening.

"Very… funny…" she said between heaves. "I could… use a… hand…"

Laughing more, I moved behind her and wrapped my hands around the cable. Muscles happened to be a side benefit of being Chat, muscles that lingered beyond the transformation. Together we managed to make quick work of the task, and in short order I was staring at my doppelgänger, albeit on his side.

"Grab that jacket and then memorize the pose. I'll lower you to that spot. And then the fun begins."

"If you say so," I muttered as I slid the leather jacket off the wax figure. Wrinkling my latent feline nose at the smell of paraffin, I let Ladybug wrap the yo-yo around me.

She snapped open her yo-yo and pulled out a pair of earwigs. "Here," she said, handing one to me and then taking the other for herself. "So we can stay in contact."

"I'm never far from your heart," I smiled as I slipped the device into my ear.

"That I know," she smiled. "Ready?"

"Yes," I said as I slid over the edge.

Very slowly, Ladybug lowered me down; the moment my feet hit the marble, the yo-yo retracted and sprung back through the skylight with its telltale _zing_. "I'm going move around to the main entrance," she said over my earwig. "Be ready."

"I'm always ready, Milady," I said quietly as I put myself into the pose my wax figure had. Fortunately, it was a fairly typical stance: slight smile, twisted torso and hands in pockets. Years of modeling meant I'd have little trouble holding the position for as long as Ladybug needed me to.

"Someone's feeling frisky," Ladybug chuckled.

"Can you blame me?" I purred – at least, as well as I could without being transformed. "Watching Milady in action always gets my engine running."

"Not really the best time to be flirting, Kitty," she admonished good naturedly. It sounded like she'd moved into a large space based on how her voice was echoing.

"You know you love it," I whispered.

"Chat! Focus."

"It's hard when I work with someone so—"

There was a loud crash several rooms away, and I heard Ladybug grunt slightly as she leapt away from something. "Ouch!" She cried out.

"Milady!" I said urgently as I started to move in her direction. "I'm on my way!"

"Belay that, Kitty!" she replied. "I'm fine, just knocked my head against a decorative planter. But the good news is I'm headed toward you. Be ready on my signal."

Reluctantly I returned to my position, nerves taught at the continuing cacophony that was, indeed, getting closer. I knew I was on the cusp of calling for my transformation despite whatever Ladybug was cooking up. "What signal?" I hissed through my frozen smile.

"You'll know it when you see it," she said. "No matter what, Kitty, don't reveal yourself until then."

"Milady, if you're in trouble—"

"No matter _what_," she said firmly. "Got it?"

Fuming, I managed to growl out: "As you wish."

The crashes grew louder and then louder still until Ladybug came careening around the arched entrance to the statuary hall I was posing in. She'd managed to hide from me over the open communications channel how out-of-breath she was, but one look told me it had taken everything and then some to stay ahead of whatever was chasing her. Crouched at the corner of the archway, she tossed her yo-yo and sailed up and over to the far side of the room, still in my line of sight but keeping a safe distance from me. There she crouched behind a version of our former mayor, the bulk of his form hiding her svelte figure.

I was facing the archway when her pursuer appeared, riding a translucent neon green cloud of some sort of energy. Much like the glimpse I'd gotten in the abandoned subway station, the figure was shrouded in some sort of brilliant beam of light, though now I knew the light source appeared to travel with her – it was quite literally part of this villain's appearance. I felt my eyes watering at the intense brightness of the light and hoped I wouldn't need to blink.

The cloud moved faster than I expected, zipping across the hall toward Ladybug. Halfway across the space, the figure raised an arm and shot a neon green burst of energy at poor Mayor Bourgeois. In a fraction of a second, he was reduced to a puddle of wax, but Ladybug was a fraction faster and had already vaulted to another position.

"You'd be more of a match if you'd brought your partner," the figure said, that voice irritatingly familiar. "But I am powerful enough to take both of you down."

"What happened to you, Manon?" Ladybug said from where she'd landed behind a statue of Jagged Stone.

_Hello again, Puppeteer,_ I thought, keeping my expression fixed. _You didn't come through for Hawkmoth the first two times; here's hoping being on your own the third time isn't the charm. _

Of course, we didn't know for sure she was under the control of Hawkmoth; based on the evidence we had so far, and what Plagg himself had told me, it was a solid bet she had somehow come into possession of a Miraculous – and not one known to our kwamis. We were in uncharted waters, but given my untransformed state, I was acutely aware of how much personal danger I was in at the moment.

I leaned into my still-simmering anger at what she had done to my friends to keep my body still, willing Ladybug to release me so I could drop into Feral Chat mode and finish this once and for all. If I'd had my tail, I knew it would be twitching violently in anticipation at sinking my claws into a good fight.

"So… you _do_ remember me, Ladybug," the figure said. "I can't tell you how touched I am. I, of course, remember you."

"How could I forget?" Ladybug replied and grinned a very Chat grin. "We've had some interesting adventures together. But the question remains: what happened to you?"

"Give me your earrings and we'll talk," Manon replied.

"You know what my answer—" Ladybug started before she was forced to leap away in order to avoid another blast of energy. Jagged's torso melted like a candle that had been left to burn all night.

I started to hope I'd not be in the line of fire.


	42. Forced Focus

**Forty-Two: Forced Focus**

_Author's Note: Turning to his skills as a model, Adrien is forced to watch passively as Ladybug teases out more information from Manon._

* * *

Ladybug danced around the statuary hall, trying to keep Manon in my line of sight while avoiding blasts of energy repeatedly sent in her direction. Years of model training were being tested to the limit, with only my promise to Ladybug rooting me in place in the pose of my wax doppelgänger. It wasn't easy one to keep, for every latent feline instinct was screaming for me to leap in and provide protective cover for Milady.

Ignoring the developing muscle aches, I focused for a bit on what I could actually make out of Manon, her form shrouded in that odd hidden-but-present floating spotlight. If my math was right, she was now a teenager, much the age we had been when Master Fu had selected us to be holders. Her mother remained a force on Paris television, though Ladybug and I had managed to avoid her repeated public requests for another intimate interview; seeing as though the only other time we'd agreed to it had akumatized her a decade earlier, it seemed like a prudent precaution.

The brilliant light of the spotlight hid most of her figure, as I suspected was the intention, but she did appear to be attired in what might pass as a "typical" Miraculous costume. What I could see of the blue, orange and white form-fitting outfit covered her completely, and I had to assume her face was masked. As she turned to take another potshot at Ladybug, I caught a glimpse of something sparkling along her wrist.

_Bracelet? _I thought. _That would make sense in an oddly warped way._

If she _was_ a holder, though, she was operating under principles that seemed quite different than how my Cat Miraculous had worked when I was her age. Without knowing what sort of kwami she was paired with, it was difficult to determine whether I was seeing the normal enhancements a Miraculous granted a holder, or if she were using her superpower. Plagg had already told me that this Miraculous was not from the box Master Fu guarded, and as Ladybug knew far more about the kwamis it held, I assumed she'd already come to the same conclusion – if Tikki hadn't already informed her of the same thing.

_So,_ I thought. _Not an akuma, but a holder. With powers like ours, purrhaps._

The light surrounding Manon was bright enough that my eyes were trying to water in self-defense. I silently prayed a teardrop wouldn't form and break my cover as I pressed on trying to divine more about our new nemesis.

_If I cautiously make the assumption that she has the same restrictions on her power that we did at that age, she _can't _be using her superpower repeatedly,_ I reasoned silently. _That beam she's shooting has to be part of her base powers? Is that even possible?_ I wondered. _And does it run her kwami down? Maybe more slowly than her superpower, but drains it nonetheless?_

It was clear there were more than a few unknowns to us surrounding Miraculous in general. It felt safe to err on the side that her jewel granted her abilities that were different than ours. I thought my next conversation with Plagg was going to be quite interesting.

I knew I needed more information immediately, though, and it appeared once more Ladybug was clearly on the same page as she continued to pepper Manon with questions. "What happened to you, Manon?" she asked again. "This is not the little kid I saw at our last encounter."

"I am as far from that person as could be," Manon said. "I refuse to be left out any longer."

"Left out?" Ladybug asked as she scooted away from another blast, hiding behind a wax statue of the current president of France. "Of what?"

"Everything," Manon said tartly. "I intend to be the main topic of conversation in Paris – that is, just as soon as I eliminate you and your partner from the scene."

_Eliminate?_ My ears would have gone straight up at that.

"Eliminate?" Ladybug echoed my though as she peered out from her hiding spot. "Why? Is that what all of the machinations have been about – to shove Chat and I out of the spotlight?"

Unwittingly, my eyes darted to that hidden-but-present spot hovering over Manon. _She means it literally_, I thought as I hastily tried to recompose my face.

"The two of you have been in the way since I was a kid. My mother's obsession with the Heroes of Paris pushed me out of her life completely; I intend to correct that, with interest."

She wasn't wrong, for aside from Alya, Nadjia had been pursuing the story of Chat and Ladybug for as long as we'd been on the scene. It troubled me to think we might have created a rift between mother and daughter, however much it had been out of our personal control.

"Is that why you went after the Ladyblogger?"

"Yes. I knew she had access to you, though I wasn't aware she was _also_ Rena Rouge," she laughed cruelly. "Or that she was getting married to Carapace. That turned out to be an unexpected bonus."

_Oh no_, I thought. _She knows their identities. That makes this a bit more difficult…_

"I don't understand how she didn't recognize you at the craft festival," Ladybug said. "She was trapped with you inside that ice cube of a carousel while Chat and I fought Stormy the first time."

There was a cackle that filled the space; a moment later, the spotlight ramped up in brilliance a thousand-fold before it winked out. Standing not more that fifteen meters in front of me was a very normal looking middle-aged woman. "This is why," Manon said, and even her voice was different. "One of my many new talents."

_One?_ I thought. _Holy kwami – maybe she has more than a single Miraculous!_

I knew that was an option, of course, given how I'd needed to combine Plagg with other kwamis over the years. It was a dangerous prospect at best, and, if Master Fu were correct, not something just anyone was capable of enduring. I wondered now if I was looking at the results of a poorly executed combination.

Another flash and her original spot lit form re-appeared; a fraction of a moment later, though, I heard the telltale chirping from a Miraculous. At least _that_ part seemed to be normal, but it begged the question how Manon had gotten her hands on possibly two jewels at a minimum. I put that aside for a moment, for the five-minute timer Manon had just uncorked created a small opening for us.

Ladybug vaulted into a new position, and then surprised me by leaping to hide behind me. It took an amazing amount of willpower not to react to her touch. As she leaned around me, she whispered just loud enough for my latent feline hearing to pick up. "Get ready."

I leaned ever so slightly into her. _Ok_.

"Lucky Charm!" she cried out suddenly.

What happened next was a perfectly choreographed effort borne from years of working together.

The room burst into waves of red and white light, brighter perhaps than normal and enough to cover my leap-and-roll behind a robust wax figure of some French dignitary from history; I wasn't as smooth as I would have been as Chat, but I got the job done and came up facing the center of the room. Ladybug had cleverly anticipated that Manon would initially recoil away from the explosion of light and sound, though shequickly recovered, blasting the space with her beam under the assumption Ladybug would be vulnerable in that moment she was summoning her Charm.

Pushing back further into the shadows, I kept my eyes trained on the space I'd so recently occupied. When the light faded, a puddle of melted wax was all that remained. I smiled slightly as there was just a hint of red-and-black in the mess. It was one of Ladybug's more inspired Charms, though she had cut it awfully close.

Manon's electric-colored cloud floated over the puddle and circled slowly. She seemed confused, but I wasn't, having heard the _ziiing_ of Ladybug's yo-yo as she soared up and through the skylight I'd been directly under.

"I couldn't have destroyed the earrings," Manon said, assuming she was alone once more. "They should be here somewhere," she continued as she circled again and then a fourth time. "They _have_ to be here!"

While an increasingly agitated Manon continued to search for any trace of Ladybug, as stealthily as I could as a human, I crept around the perimeter of the statuary room and snuck into a small alcove just off to the side of archway. Thinking I was far enough away, I called out quietly: "Plagg – claws out!"

The glow had barely faded before I felt strong arms wrap themselves around my costumed torso and yank me further backwards. "Keep quiet," Ladybug hissed. "And don't move."

I nodded curtly and pressed myself into her form; despite the obvious danger we were in, part of my furbrain was finding the close contact rather… stimulating. I tried to focus and turned my masked eyes toward the space beyond our hiding spot.

Manon burst through on her cloud vehicle, moving slowly but at too rapid a pace to be actually searching for anything. She was muttering to herself, or worse, was talking to an unknown co-villain we'd yet to meet. I took a chance and slid out my baton, deftly twisting it to let the small disc of a cat tracker fall into a paw. Timing it just right, I hurled the tracker at the receding form of Manon and watched with small satisfaction as it adhered to an upper shoulder blade.

Manon kept moving, so I hoped that meant she hadn't felt anything.

"We might not have the tracker for long," I whispered. "It will go away if she detransforms."

"It should be enough of a start," Ladybug whispered back. "We'll let her clear the building and then pursue."

Snapping my baton open to tracking mode, I nodded and then narrowed my masked eyes when the cat-logo appeared on my tracker. "Gotcha," I smiled, before turning back to her. "What are you hoping she leads us to?" I asked. "And more importantly, where did she get her Miraculous?"

"I don't know the answer to either of those," Ladybug said. "Which tells me it's gonna be a long night."

I felt her press herself against my back to look at the screen on the baton, and was momentarily distracted by her closeness again. "Milady," I purred, unable to stop _that_ either, "she's about to leave the building. We should go."

"Sorry," Ladybug answered before gently nibbling at my human ear. "I just can't resist you, it seems," she said devilishly.

"Dear kwami," I replied, my masked eyes squeezed shut. _Of all the times_…

"Amen, Chat.," she said, her breath hot in my ear. "Come on, let's wrap this up and get home. I've got a kitty who needs some purrsonal attention."


	43. Sleight of Paw

Forty-Three: Sleight of Paw

_Author's Note: Chat and Ladybug follow Manon, determined to separate the teenager from the Miraculous she appears to have obtained. But do so will require all of the cunning Chat has in his toolbox._

* * *

Manon moved quickly once she was clear of the museum.

We followed at a discrete distance, trying to trail her as stealthily as we could given both of us were moving about as fast as our own enhanced Miraculous skills allowed us to do. It had been years since I'd begun to feel fatigued when helicoptering or pole-vaulting my way across Paris, but by the time Manon and her neon-green electric cloud curled around a corner and disappeared into an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of the city, I was breathing hard.

Dropping down beside Ladybug on the flat roof of an adjoining warehouse, I took a longer moment than normal to try and catch my breath. Snapping open my baton, Ladybug leaned over as we both watched the cat tracker logo vanish from the screen. "End of the line," I said. "What do you think?"

"I'd say it we were almost looking at a trope," she smiled. "Villain has a secret hideaway tucked into a neglected neighborhood? I'd walk out of this movie, to be honest."

Arching a masked eyebrow at my partner, my tail wrapped around her waist. "Even if I'd paid for it, Milady?"

"_Especially_ if you'd paid for it," she laughed as she gently batted away my tail.

"This is quite real," I pointed out. "I'm not a psychologist, but I feel like this tells us something about her. Besides the fact that she's wearing more than one Miraculous."

Ladybug shuddered slightly at that and quickly recovered. I was aware that she'd successfully pulled off using nearly the entire Miracle Box some years earlier but hadn't done it since; though she had studiously avoided talking about it, I knew the experience had rattled her pretty badly – and that was _before_ I knew she was Marinette. Now that I had that nugget of info, I intended to use the full force of my purrsaive powers to get her to open up a bit more.

Not wanting to force the issue too badly at that point, I very gently asked: "She's wearing more than one Miraculous, isn't she?"

Ladybug visibly shuddered again. "Yes, I think so."

"That's damn dangerous."

"Yes," she acknowledged. "But it also means that while she's charging one kwami, she may still have the full use of the other." Ladybug looked at me. "Or more."

My masked eyes widened. "_More_? Where on earth did she come across one, let alone more?"

Ladybug sighed. "Maybe she came into possession of a Miracle Box of her own? Stranger things have happened."

"She's a _teenager_," I cried. "I doubt she's ever left Paris! I can't believe she'd stumble across one, lying on the sidewalk by the Seine!"

"I agree," Ladybug nodded. "And yet, here we are. At the very least, she is a holder. But it would behoove us to assume she's more powerful even than that."

"To manage a whole Box, though, she'd have to be a Guardian, right?" I asked. "Like Master Fu?"

"Yes."

I looked down at the abandoned warehouse below us, a million thoughts rapidly coursing through my feline brain. We'd fought hundreds of akumas over the years, but aside from Hawkmoth and Mayura, had never directly taken on another Miraculous holder. And why should we have? Everything that I knew about our roles as heroes meant we were supposed to be the protectors of the city we loved, not the antagonists. Hawkmoth was _supposed_ to be the exception to the rule.

"This is not random," I said softly. "Someone intended for her to find the Miraculous that she has," I added as I turned my feline eyes on my girlfriend. "And I would wager that while they may have provided her with more than one, they didn't trust her with an entire box."

Ladybug nodded slowly. "You might be on to something," she said. "And I can only think of one person that would come up with a plan like that."

I sighed. "Hawkmoth. It's clever, actually; she'd not akumatized so technically his hands are clean. He gets her to take us on, and then swoops in when we're the most vulnerable to take us out."

"He's not controlling her, though, is he?" she mused. "That's risky on his part."

I shook my head. "He's been using people's emotions against them for more than a decade, Milady. I suspect Hawkmoth thinks he knows teenagers better than most."

Ladybug smiled. "We were teenagers once, too," she said as she looked back at the warehouse. "And were a bit more recently that Hawkmoth, I'll wager."

"I'm glad you think I've finally grown up, bugaboo."

"I didn't say _that_," she chuckled as she scratched behind my ear. "Listen, we already know she's pissed off about her mother. I feel like we should be able to use that to our advantage here."

"In what way?"

"Well, she's an angry teenager, right? Do we try to calm her down? Or make her more angry, hoping she makes a mistake?"

Arching a masked eyebrow, I replied. "Given how it went in the museum, I would submit the calming down option would be ineffective. But… she does think she knows you. Knows _us_. She was really surprised when you vanished after casting your Lucky Charm."

Ladybug started to smile. "We've been a public duo for years now. And with her mother covering ever last detail of our exploits… yes, there it is," she said softly, and I could see once more her Lucky Vision kicking in.

She stared into space for a few moments, and then snapped back to the here-and-now. "Do you trust me?"

"Like you have to ask," I said as I rolled my eyes. "But when you _do_ ask me that, I generally don't like what's coming next."

"You won't," she laughed. "Now, take off your tail, please."

* * *

Ladybug was quite right, I did _not_ like the plan she came up with.

After arguing with her until I was blue in the face, less than ten minutes later Marinette roughly yanked me through the doorway we'd seen Manon go use and into the dark interior. She'd looped my belt around my lower torso a few times, cinching my arms tight against my sides, and was using the excess as something of a lead. "I'm not a dog," I growled as she yanked me again, causing me to stumble slightly on the uneven surface.

"Quiet," she said loudly.

"Mari," I growled louder. "This is a mistake. Don't do this."

"Shut up," she said.

It wasn't hard for me to stay in character as her irate captive; I'd been glaring from the moment she'd explained her plans and then de-transformed. "I'm not feline complying," I growled again, and yanked against her pull. In theory, I should be able to break free of her, but the belt was made of the same nearly indestructible material as my costume. I was more than a little worried she'd handicapped me more than intended.

"Manon!" Marinette cried out, ignoring my tugging. "I've got this mangy alley cat! Take him off my hands!"

"What are you _doing_?" I hissed as I struggled a bit more. "Mari, whatever you think I did with Ladybug—"

She whirled on me. "I know _exactly_ what you did with that vixen!" she yelled.

It took all of my model training not to burst into laughter. "It meant _nothing_," I yelled back, staying in character. "I love you, Mari!"

"Whatever," she huffed as she yanked me, hard.

I'd expected that particular move and I feigned a stumble; to my surprise, though, Marinette deftly wrapped the belt around me again as I tumbled to the dusty floor. The musty odor assaulted my feline senses and I frowned. "That wasn't in the plan!" I accused quietly.

"Dramatic license," Marinette replied softly before placing a foot on my side and cinching the belt tighter.

"Hey!" I howled at the uncomfortable embrace. "Look… let's talk about this!"

"_Manon_!" She yelled again.

"How did you find me?" Manon's voice filtered from the nether regions of the space.

"I didn't," Marinette said. "He did. And I was following him."

"Why did you follow him?" Manon asked, her voice growing louder. "That's a curious action from a girlfriend."

Marinette shrugged. "He claimed he wasn't seeing Ladybug any longer; I needed to know for sure. When I saw him with her earlier, I knew he'd lied. He only came _here_ because you've killed his one true love."

I glared at Marinette, only partially acting; she was certainly laying it on thick.

"She'd better _not_ be dead," I growled as I struggled – for real – against my tail.

_Man_, I thought, _she's wound it tight._

I narrowed my masked eyes menacingly at Manon. "If you've hurt her in any way—"

"Boys," Marinette sighed dramatically. "Am I right?"

"Why are you here?" Manon appeared out of the shadows, once more atop her neon cloud. "What do you want from me?"

"_He_—" she said before shoving me with her foot, "—told me what you've done to my _former_ friend, Alya." She looked at me. "I want to control him like you control her. That's the only way I can keep this tomcat to myself."

I twisted around to try and look at Marinette. "Mari," I said urgently, letting a tiny amount of panic appear in my voice. "What… what are you doing?"

"Fixing things," she said. Turning back to Manon, she asked: "I want your help. Can you give me the Lovers Bracelet?"

"_Marinette!_" I hissed. "No! Look, I know you're angry, but seriously? You can't put a collar on this kitty!"

"That's _exactly_ what I want to do," Marinette said, glaring at me. "It's for your own good," she said pointedly before turning back toward Manon. "Once I've trained him better, maybe he can be more useful to whatever it is you're trying to do here."

Manon slowly circled us, considering. "Are you proposing some sort of partnership?" she asked.

"Maybe." She looked down at me. "I get a more pliant feline, and you get some muscle." She looked back at Manon. "Besides, without Ladybug, he's not all that useful to Paris any longer anyway, right?"

"He could be handy," Manon considered as she circled even closer. "Chat could be a dangerous animal in captivity," she mused. "I no longer pull the strings of Alya or her boyfriend; my connection to the bracelets has been broken, and I think your feline boyfriend here had something to do with it."

"Maybe," I said smugly. "You shouldn't mess with magic you don't understand."

"I know _exactly_ what I am wielding!" Manon said coldly. "As your beloved Ladybug discovered to her peril."

"I wasn't talking about your Miraculous," I growled, narrowing my masked feline eyes again.

Ignoring me, Marinette stared at Manon. "Do we have a deal? Two spurned girls with the Power of Destruction behind us?"

"I'll never help you," I said coldly. "I will fight you claw and tooth."

Manon paused in front of me and started to hold up her hands, palms to the sky. "I doubt that very much," she said with a cruel laugh. "_Bijoux mystiques créer_!" she cried.

The bracelet I'd seen earlier on her left hand lit up. and a moment later, the space above her palms burst into light, much like a Lucky Charm. Energy clouds swirled, twisted and pulsed before fading to nothing. In the same spot, a literal cat collar (sized up for a human, of course) spun slowly in the air until Manon grasped it. Despite the dire situation, I had to admit Manon had taste, for it matched my costume quite neatly, right down to a small metallic accent on the non-buckle side.

My masked eyes widened as she stepped off her cloud vehicle and kneeled down toward me. I squirmed a bit and managed to get a few centimeters distant before Marinette yanked on the belt. "Marinette, listen to me," I said, not needing to feign a slight amount of panic. This charade of ours was getting a little too real for my comfort. Squirming more, I tried to lean away from Manon's deadly attention. "This won't solve anything! You're playing right into her hands!"

"You might be right," Marinette said with a smile. "But it will make me feel better."

"Mari—" I started.

"This will only hurt a little," Manon said as she leaned down and started to place the collar around my neck. As it brushed my skin, I could feel a slight buzz of electricity, and my ears flattened against my mane in response. A low, guttural growl came from somewhere deep inside me as I squirmed even more.

Marinette moved in slightly, and I felt the belt relax from around my torso. It was hard not to let the Chat-is-about-to-get-his-prey smile appear on my face, so I settled instead for freezing my expression on get-any-closer-and-I'll-growl-more.

"You might want to hurry," Marinette advised.

"Why?" Manon asked, pausing to look up at Mari.

"No particular reason," she said.

That was the moment of inattention I'd been waiting for. Leaning into my enhanced feline reflexes, I flexed out of my belt restraints, sending my poor tail halfway across the warehouse. Marinette simultaneously tackled Manon to the ground, and in a swift action, I tumbled into her, using one paw to knock the collar away and the other to pin her two hands together.

"Cataclysm!" I cried and quickly brought my ring hand down on the bracelet.

I was aware that I could damage a Miraculous with my power, and it brought me no satisfaction to see the magical jewel glow white hot and then crack into two parts, sliding off Manon's wrist and falling to the concrete with a metallic clang. The de-transformation wave washed over her, removing one layer from her super-suit.

It wasn't enough.

As the kwami from the destroyed jewel appeared, Manon threw the two of us off and rolled away. Shooting to her feet, she started to sprint into the darkness. I turned to the vaguely duck-shaped kwami. "I'm sorry, my little friend," I said sadly as I started to run after Manon.

"You must be the holder of the Cat Miraculous," the yellow kwami observed as it flew next to me. Behind us, I heard Marinette call for her transformation. "Don't apologize; this rather inexperienced holder had fused two of us together. I don't think there would have been other way to separate us."

"She has a second one?" This was from Ladybug who had raced to catch up to me.

"Yes," the small duck said in her cute voice. "And there is a third squirreled away at her home."

We rounded a corner, entering a tall rectangular chamber with a metallic staircase hugging the walls. Manon was flying up the treads, barely touching them as she tried to put distance between us. "What is the second jewel?"

"Lapel pin," the duck said. "Left shoulder."

"Are you sure I _have_ to use Cataclysm?" I asked. "Without your jewels-"

"There's no other way," she said sadly. "The fusing was done wrong. Both jewels have been irreparably damaged now."

"Got it!" I vaulted up the steps, four at a time, and landed in a crouch on a landing halfway to the ceiling. Sliding my baton out, my masked eyes tracked Manon as she continued up the long stairway, presumably trying to escape to the roof. Timing it, I snapped the baton in half and hurled them at her, then leapt into the open space of the stairwell.

The batons forcefully smacked her from behind, the two angles able to used her momentum to push her up and over the railing; I caught her as she tumbled end-over-end, cursing as she fell.

"Cataclysm!" I cried again as we fell, twisting around to tap the hummingbird-shaped lapel pin. It cracked apart and fell away from us, and the second wave of de-transformation washed over Manon; as we dropped into the massive polka-dotted airbag the bottom of the stairwell that was Ladybug's Lucky Charm, I found myself holding a beautiful young woman, albeit with a face twisted in anger.

"No! No!" she cried, belting me repeatedly in the costumed chest will balled up fists. "This is not how it was supposed to go!"

Torn between wanting to hug her to calm her down and needing to get away from her barrage, I opted to roll the two of us off the airbag and onto the floor. A small hummingbird of a kwami, light green in color, joined the duck one, floating a meter in front of me. "Thank you," he said formally. "We were rather trapped there."

"You're welcome, but I am so sorry I had to destroy your Miraculous," I said sadly, then turned my masked eyes to Manon. "Will she be okay?" I asked quietly, for the teenager had sunk to her knees and was babbling rather incoherently.

"Not just anyone can combine more than one Miraculous at a time," the hummingbird kwami said. "This holder was not prepared mentally or physically for the challenge."

The duck looked to Ladybug. "If you are the holder of the Bug Miraculous, though, you may be able to help her."

Ladybug frowned. "How? I repair _things_ normally, not people."

The hummingbird smiled. "You hold the Power of Creation," he said kindly. "It can do far more than just repair buildings."

"Can she repair your jewels?" I asked impulsively.

The duck shook her head. "Not even the most powerful Miraculous holder could perform that magic," she said before looking to Manon. "But you can help her."

Ladybug looked to me. "I have a feline you can do it," I smiled.

"Okay…" she said. Knowing the airbag was too big to toss, she simply placed her hand against it and cried out, "Miraculous Ladybug!"

The stairwell burst into fireworks of red and white light, and her millions of helpers immediately swarmed around Manon. They had enough energy that her hair started to wave with the force of their movement. Frantically, the helpers spun faster and faster around the young teenager before bursting away in a flash of white light.

As I blinked to clear my vision, Manon came into focus, sitting on her knees with a confused expression on her face. "Chat… Chat Noir?" she asked before looking to Ladybug. A definite frown appeared when she saw my partner. "Ladybug? Where am I?"

"Safe," she smiled as she knelt to put a hand to her shoulder. "What is the last thing you remember?"

Manon blinked. "Uh… I was at home? Alone, again, 'cause Mom had left to get the two of you on camera. Again." She frowned. "I was kinda angry – actually, I was a _lot_ angry, now that I think about it. And then I found these boxes…" she trailed off, a fuzzy expression on her face. "I think?"

"What day is this?" I asked her.

"That's a funny question," Manon laughed. "It's November 29. Why do you ask?"

I shot a look at Ladybug, for that meant Manon had just lost more than a month of memories. The fusing had to have gone very badly indeed. "Let's get you home," I said neutrally. "We'll explain everything on the way."

* * *

I found myself stretched out on our couch, clasping a wineglass in one paw as I realized it was four in the morning. I was alone for the moment, as Ladybug was still with Master Fu, dropping off the three kwamis we had so recently become acquainted with. The third one had been in a box buried in the back of Manon's closet; I had surreptitiously searched the house while Ladybug had explained what had gone down to an increasingly upset Nadjia. I had to hand it to my partner, for by the time we left she had the two of them laughing, crying and hugging, well on the way toward healing the fractures that had appeared in their family.

As I'd watched Ladybug carefully point out the responsibilities of parenthood, I'd thought two things: first, my own Father could have stood some of that same lecture at various points of my upbringing, given how distant he had been. I had more than my own share of quiet, empty moments at the dining room table; I'm not sure I wouldn't have had the same issues as Manon if Plagg hadn't appeared in my life when he did. I could completely understand Manon's misuse of her gift of a Miraculous.

Second, I realized as I sipped my wine that Ladybug would make a damn good mother. I knew I wasn't quite ready for kittens – yet – but seeing her in action confirmed for me I was one lucky feline. Suddenly, a mental image of small Chat or Kitty Noirs roaming our apartment, complete with black-leather costumes brought a sly smile to my face, for I wondered if Marinette knew what she might be getting into.

I suspected she did.

I heard the key in our apartment door and lifted my mane up slightly to see over the edge of the couch. "Princess?" I said as my masked eyes caught her tired but still beautiful blue ones.

"Thank God that is over," she sighed as she tossed her keys on the breakfast bar and came around the edge of the couch. Sliding my boots off the couch, she curled her feet beneath her at the end. "Master Fu confirms what we thought, the three kwamis we recovered are from another box."

"Great," I rolled my eyes. "Do they know where it is?"

"No," she said. "They were dormant when removed and given to Manon."

"So it could be anywhere?"

"Likely. It seems quite possible that Hawkmoth came across them as a batch, much as he must have discovered the Moth originally. But we won't know if he found the whole box until he unleashes more Manons on us."

"But another box," I mused. "I thought Master Fu was the last remaining Guardian?"

"He was just as surprised as we were," she said before yawning. "Fu also thinks Manon won't recall anything at all, given what I told him about how the Miraculous Cure affected her."

I smiled. "So Rena and Cap are still on the team?"

"For now," she laughed and the yawned again.

"Come here," I said as I put down my wine glass and held out my arms.

Marinette slipped in front of me and pressed her back into my chest, snuggling her head just below my chin. Sighing contentedly, she said softly, "Can we call in sick to work tomorrow?"

"Maybe tomorrow," I said as my purring started up. "But since it's already _today_, Princess…"

"Damn," she said a moment before her breathing became very regular.

Smiling, I made sure the alarm on my baton was set before burying my nose in her hair and letting myself drift off to dreams of kittens and chocolate croissants.

* * *

_Special note: Sorry this is late in posting! I realized as I went to upload this earlier today, where I had broken the story to feed into next week's chapter was just, well, cruel to the reader. So I had to hurriedly finish what would have been next week's chapter. Bonus! Thanks for waiting. -ep_


	44. Recharging

**Forty-Four: Recharging**

_Author's Note: Given the crazy period they'd just lived through, Chat and Marinette decide a little downtime is in order so they can regroup – and start to adjust to their new reality as a couple._

* * *

After the past few days – heck, the past few _months_ – dealing with the havoc that Manon had wreaked in our purrsonal lives, Marinette and I withdrew to the apartment the very next weekend, pulled down the shades and definitively decided not to go anywhere, or do anything except spend the weekend with each other. There was plenty for the two of us to talk through, for sure, given we'd not yet had a chance to fully digest the abrupt unmasking of our respective alter-egos. And there was the little matter of a second Miracle Box possibly in the hands of our arch-nemesis.

It felt like a weekend off, out of view of Paris, was exactly what the feline would order. And he did.

The weekend started off well. Sleeping in was the first item on the agenda, and as I swam up through the layers of a wonderful dream starring a certain polka-dotted hero, a beach and a black cat that looked suspiciously like me, I blinked and stretched and tried to wake up without disturbing Marinette. It was something of a tall order, given the spooning position we'd ultimately wound up in after certain other extracurricular activities had wound down and we'd given in to our pleasant exhaustion.

Carefully, I slid out from beneath the sheets, noting with an arched eyebrow that Marinette had managed once more to steal the balance of the fabric. Without my costume, it had gotten a little chilly, and I shivered as I quietly tip-toed to my bathroom to toss on a pair of sweats and an old Ladybug t-shirt. The mirror only confirmed that my hair was officially bedhead, a look that my stylist normally spent forty minutes to create. Smiling at my image, it took a moment for me to register how odd it was not to see the mask and ears, given how long I had transformed by rote each morning before seeing my girlfriend to start the day.

I quietly slipped out into the kitchen and padded in bare feet to the fridge, and pulled open the door to determine what my options were for whipping up breakfast-in-bead for Milady. To my surprise, Plagg was sitting on the top shelf, his tiny belly slightly distended. The partially open box for the wheel of camembert told the whole story, and I glared at my kwami.

"Seriously?" I whispered. "You could have taken it out of the fridge."

"I could have," he smiled as he softly belched. "But this is the good stuff. I needed to baby it, to coddle it and keep it happy. It needed to be caressed—"

"Ooooookay," I interrupted. "Do you want some additional alone time, then?"

"No," Plagg sighed. "I'm good."

"I'm sure," I laughed quietly.

Working around him, I retrieved the makings for a cheese-and-ham quiche and put them down on the counter. Marinette and her family had taken Chat under their wing when I first started to date her, guiding me from boiling water all the way through a four-course formal holiday meal with all of the trimmings. While we didn't tend to get that fancy when it was just the two of us, I had discovered the pure joy of preparing a fine meal for someone you love, as well as the emotional benefits of focusing on the work, and forgetting about the troubles of the world for a little while.

Kneading dough was especially helpful during Hawkmoth's more manic periods, and the irony was not lost on me with respect to a cat kneading. Admittedly, as I pressed the butter crust I'd created into a small circular dish, I had found some tasks easier to do while transformed, given how much stronger I was when wearing the ears and mask. The claws were pretty handy, too, though Marinette had never been impressed with the fact I could leave the kitchen wearing the mess I'd created from feline ears to boots, quickly transform in my bedroom and return looking good as new.

Marinette appeared in the doorway of my suite as I was finishing the cream mix for the filling of the quiche. She yawned as she stretched, and somehow had located my oversized black t-shirt with the green paw-print logo I'd bought from a novelty website last year. "Hey, Kitty," she said as she slid onto a barstool. She smiled sleepily at me. "I've not slept that well in months."

"We've both had a lot on our respective plates," I reminded her, brushing back a bang that had fallen into my face. "And felines are known for their somnambulant qualities."

"Adrien," she said with a trace of humor to her voice, "you weren't transformed last night."

I arched an eyebrow at her and smiled. "Latent feline qualities, then?"

"Maybe," she said as she put a finger to her chin. "I did miss the purring, though."

Pouring the filling into the shell, I laughed. "I can fix that."

"I know you can," she said, and then paused. "Don't take this the wrong way, but this is… weird."

Using a spatula, I scooped out the dregs and then put the ceramic mixing bowl into the increasingly full sink. Wiping my hands on a dishtowel, I smiled at her. "I'm happy to transform if you'd feel more comfortable."

"It's not that, exactly," she said, a slight flame on her cheeks. "As I alluded the other night, I've known who was under the mask for some time. But seeing you – as Adrien – here in our domestic space with me… after so long of only seeing the mask and ears… I guess I need to adjust my reality a bit."

"I get it," I said, smiling slyly. "Living with a gorgeous supermodel can do that to people."

"Chat!" she cried out.

I leaned down on the counter and put my chin on my hands. "There it is," I purred, narrowing my human eyes in as close an approximation of Chat's smoldering look I could muster.

Marinette sighed. "Incorrigible," she muttered as she leaned her forehead into her hand.

"Black cat," I reminded her as I slid the quiche into the oven.

"How long does that have to bake?" she asked from behind me.

I turned and saw the look on her face. "Long enough," I smiled.

* * *

The balance of Saturday was spent pretty much in that manner; when we weren't eating, we were entangled in each other, making up for what seemed to have been an endless amount of lost time. Hawkmoth managed to intrude into our early afternoon, but even _that_ turned out to be fortuitous, allowing me to pick up some fresh ingredients for salad and lasagna, as well as some items of a slightly more purrsonal nature. Our earlier, albeit brief, discussion about kittens mandated I keep up my end of the bargain, and I'd been a little surprised at how empty my nightstand drawer had become.

Time and supplies fly when you're having fun, it seems.

Marinette found a still-transformed Chat unpacking the groceries in the kitchen; she'd returned to the apartment ahead of me after our brief but ugly fight with Hawkmoth and managed to sneak in a shower while I'd been out shopping. As she toweled her hair, I paused, one paw holding a jar of pasta sauce as I smiled my best Chat smile. "Your hair is gorgeous when it's down," I said. "I'm glad you wear it like that more often these days."

"Thanks," she replied as she folded the towel over the edge of one of the chairs. "You did a much better job of disguising your hair than I did," she said as she came around to unpack the final satchel.

"You think so?" I laughed. "It's just longer and has two feline ears."

She reached up and brushed back a bang. "Maybe, but add the mask like you have," she said as she ran a finger along one edge of it, "and you don't look much like your alter-ego, Chat." Marinette smiled as she pulled out the box of lasagna noodles for me and then snapped on the burner where the pot with water was sitting. "I, on the other hand, just added a mask. I don't know how you didn't recognize the pigtails."

"Willful blindness," I said as I pulled out the baking dish and set it on the counter beside the baguette that would soon become garlic bread. I'd had that particular oddity when on a photo shoot in the United States and had fallen in love with it, though my twist had a definite French flair to it. "We both saw – or didn't see – what we wanted at the time."

"True," she said, and then smiled wickedly.

My masked eyes narrowed. "What are you-ooooooooohhh," I gasped, squeezing my masked eyes shut as Marinette gently rubbed the tip of a feline ear between two fingers. "Princess… oooh, boy…. I'm trying to make dinner…"

"It's not my fault you didn't de-transform," she laughed merrily as a rumble of a purr burst from me. "What's a girl to do when she sees those cute kitty ears?"

"Purr-purrincess-" I tried again, then faltered, completely unable to focus on anything other than her amazing touch.

I'm not sure how long it was before she released my ear, and as I took a deep breath to try and tamp down some pretty intense feline instincts, those same feline ears pivoted as I heard Marinette snap off the burner to the stovetop. Cracking open a masked eye, I watched as she reached up and snared my bell to gently pull me down to a kiss. "I think," she said softly as she tugged me toward her room, "dinner can wait for a bit."

Who was I to argue?

* * *

Lasagna preparation long forgotten, I was curled around Marinette, protectively covering her with my costumed body against the chill of the early evening. We were enraptured by the twinkling lights just visible through her doors to her balcony as the city embraced the night, though to be honest, I only had feline eyes for my Princess.

It was the first time I'd been invited to enter her suite, having studiously avoided intruding on her privacy from the moment we'd moved in together; now, knowing she was Ladybug, I realized that had served a dual purpose, as she had used her balcony escape much as I had on the other side of the apartment. As my night-enhanced vision looked around the space, I could see she had made it her own; I'd provided the initial furniture, but the interior decorating was all Marinette. Soft tones of pink and white were the order of the day, and to my delight, she still had the cat pillow I had first seen back at the Bakery.

Framed pictures of us – mostly taken _by_ us using selfie mode on her phone or my baton – had pride of place on one wall, with another wall full of portraits of her parents and our friends. It occurred to me that other than my two very precious photos of Marinette in my room, I had very little in the way of personal effects. Much of that had been intentional, since I'd been trying to mask my true identity when we first moved in; but now that I thought about it, I realized there had been hardly anything from my life before Marinette that I had wanted to bring with me. There were a few cherished possessions from my childhood, but that was about it.

Marinette was my world, and as I snuggled down into her a bit more, purring, I realized that had been true from nearly the very beginning.

"We stay like this much longer and there will be no dinner tonight," I whispered to my girlfriend.

I felt her chuckle. "I've never had lasagna for breakfast," she said as she swiftly flipped around to face me. "I'm game if you are," she added as she pressed her lips to mine.

Any resolve I'd had melted away beneath her kiss. With a quiet _meowrr_, I flipped the sheet over our heads with a free paw and proceeded to become the attentive kitty my girlfriend deserved.


	45. Valentines

**Forty-Five: Valentine**

_Author's Note: A month of fruitless searching for the mysterious new Miraculous Box frustrates Chat to no end, but he takes a much needed pause to celebrate the first Valentine's Day with Marinette in their new apartment. Too bad it's on a weekday._

* * *

_Special note: With a timely assist from Bunnix, eagle-eyed readers will realize I have jumped ahead timeline-wise in an attempt to catch back up to the current calendar, since this story originally unfolded in "real time" until the Manon storyline hijacked my plans. I am also cheating slightly in doubly-eagle-eyed readers may recognize a version of this chapter originally appeared in MariChatJune last year. I've reworked it to fit into the new narrative (identities had not been revealed in the first version posted) and shifted a few key points. _

* * *

I woke early and rolled out of bed, stretching but not nearly as luxuriously as I could when transformed. Plagg was still snoring in the small bed Marinette had given him for Christmas, surrounded by socks he'd stolen out of my laundry hamper. It brought a smile to my face, seeing how settled the two of us had become with our new reality that my girlfriend, who happened to be slumbering a handful of meters across the apartment from me, was also my partner, Ladybug. I could _kind_ of hear her snoring with what little feline abilities I possessed when I was Adrien, so I knew I had time.

Hearing her brought a smile to my face, for it was unusual to be apart even that minimal distance. I'd had an unusually late meeting at House of Gabriel, though, and hadn't wanted to wake Marinette upon my return; I was well aware that she had been spending plenty of late nights at Chateau Le Blanc, and figured she could use a night off from feline attention. Slipping into my room from the balcony had been the gentlemanly thing to do, even if this particular feline found the prospect of sleeping alone even for a single night disquieting.

I pulled on the well-worn fitness tank-top I'd left hanging on the back of my bathroom door, well aware of how it hugged my Chat-inspired musculature. I was a model, after all, and not above distracting my Princess with the view. Splashing water on my face to chase the last cobwebs away, I smiled at the Ladybug-themed sleeping pants; they had become a running joke since our mutual reveal a few weeks earlier.

The frown came quickly after, for that reminded me we'd not made any progress on locating the mythical Miracle Box from which Manon's kwamis had been from. Master Fu had confirmed what we suspected – there originally had been many other boxes out there in the world, each dedicated to a particular part of the planet - though all had been lost through what the Guardian would only say had been an unexpected disaster. He had incorrectly assumed his box had been the sole survivor of whatever cataclysm had occurred. Wherever it was in Paris, it was well hidden with nary a clue to its existence.

Trying to regain my upbeat mood, I thought for just a moment before grinning and calling for my transformation; it somehow seemed purrfect that I'd appear to her that morning as the feline she'd fallen for. In truth, I now knew that she'd deduced my alter-ego's identity while we'd been in college, and to be honest, I'd been close to making the connection with Ladybug several times. Grinning wider at my now masked visage, I thanked the kwamis yet again that we had been paired by Master Fu all those many years ago.

Out in the kitchen, I quietly snuck out the ingredients to make waffles. Those cooking lessons she'd given me years ago at the Bakery had stood me in good stead since we moved in together, and as it was Valentine's Day, I wanted to flex a bit and give her something special. Being a weekday, we both had to get to work so I needed to work quickly to pull it off. I was also aware that both of us had engagements that evening - she with work, and me doing our regular patrol solo; this would be our only time to celebrate the Lover's Holiday.

I pulled the batter out of the fridge, having made it over my lunch hour the prior day. I set it on the counter next to the special waffle iron that had nearly not made it in time. The little light had just gone off, so I quickly poured in the first round of batter and closed the lid.

While the first waffle steamed into existence, I laid some bacon across parchment paper and placed it into the oven; after setting the timer, I popped open the blueberry syrup I'd ordered from a small vendor in America that promised to taste like freshly picked fruit. The smell as I poured in into a saucepan to carefully warm up convinced me I'd made a good decision.

Humming to myself happily, I continued with my preparations and had just popped open the champagne for the mimosas when a sleepy-eyed Marinette appeared at her doorway and padded her way to the barstool across from me. "You've been busy, Chat," she said, eyes taking in the kitchen.

I leaned over to kiss her. "It's a special day," I said. "And I wanted to do something for my special person." I poured out the champagne into a fluted glass, added some orange juice, and slid it across to her. "Hungry?"

"Very," she said.

Putting on potholders, I withdrew two plates from the oven piled high with waffles and placed one in front of her; mine went beside her. The bacon was already waiting in a casserole and I quickly decanted the blueberry syrup into a carafe. I carefully untied my "This Kitty Is A Pure Bread" apron she'd given me during our lessons and started to pull it over my head; it was designed for a smaller version of me but I'd insisted on continuing to use it whenever in the kitchen.

My face wrinkled slightly as it caught on one of my feline ears. "Ow!" I said as I struggled a bit.

"Hold up," Marinette laughed as she came to my rescue, getting up on her tip-toes to carefully unwrap the apron from my unruly mane. "There," she said as she set the apron to the side and kissed me for good measure.

"Thanks," I laughed.

"Anytime," she chuckled as she slipped back around to her seat and then finally looked at her plate. "These… these are paw-shaped," she said, looking up.

"Yes," I smiled as I laid the offending apron on the countertop and circled around the island to sit beside her. "I special-ordered it."

She looked back down. The waffle was a perfect facsimile of my Chat logo - with one change. I had added a tiny heart pattern inside the pad. "This is adorable!"

I leaned over and hugged her. "A tiny something," I smiled as I kissed her. "Now, try this syrup before it gets cold."

We dug in and I was pleasantly surprised that the waffles had come out as well as they had. I didn't normally do a yeast-based version, but the fluffiness was fantastic. Marinette agreed as we were clearing away the dishes. "I'd love for you to make those again," she said.

"I'm on it," I laughed. "And I'm glad you enjoyed them. I had a good teacher, you know."

"Just 'good?'" she asked, mock-frowning.

"Okay, the best," I answered quickly, then pulled her into a hug with a deep kiss.

"I've got to get ready for work," Marinette said sadly, after I let her go.

"Me, too." I kissed her goodbye and retreated to my bedroom, and she to hers.

The day passed uneventfully; I was booked for an auto show that day, standing next to a car and smiling. Some of the gigs felt like they were eliminating my brain cells, and this was high on that list. I was so bored, in fact, that I shucked out of the wardrobe they'd made me wear and removed the makeup in world record time. I fairly ran out the exit of the exhibit hall to locate the first empty alley I could find in order to transform back to Chat Noir.

* * *

Patrol was thankfully uneventful, though I'd had the unexpected pleasure of roaming Paris with my good friend, Viperion. I'd found him sitting atop one of his favorite hangouts, strumming his lyre thoughtfully; he was alone on the Lover's Holiday, apparently, though I thought his alter-ego had been dating a record executive from his label. I didn't need my feline sensitivity to realize something had gone wrong, so I invited him to tag along, an invitation he quickly accepted. Luka and I had our ups and downs over the years, but he was a trusted friend and a valued member of our team – and had the driest sense of humor I had ever encountered.

We parted ways a few blocks from the _Liberty_, which made me smile. Some of my best memories from my teenage years had been spent jamming with Kitty Section on the deck of his mother's eclectic boat. Last I'd heard, she was touring once more with Jagged Stone, which _had_ to be story unto itself.

The apartment wasn't too much further, and as I sailed through the relatively quiet evening, I thought of all of those prior Valentine's Days that I had furrvently hoped would be _the_ night – the one when Ladybug finally said "yes" to my advances. It had never happened, of course, and ultimately I'd begun to close my heart to the possibility. It had let me to Marinette, though, and in a surprising turn, right back to Ladybug. Life can be funny in a warped kind of way.

Landing on my balcony, I rolled into the bedroom and right out into the main space. I'd not expected Marinette to be home and had intended to grab a cup of coffee before turning in. Instead, I tumbled right into my girlfriend who was busily setting something up on the counter.

"Princess?" I asked, rubbing my head where it had crashed into her thigh.

"Do you normally do that when I'm not here?" she countered, raising an eyebrow.

"Maybe," I smirked as I stood up. "You're back early."

"As are you." She'd placed herself in front of whatever she'd been working on.

My masked eyes narrowed and I tried to sneak around her. "What is that?"

"Nothing," she said, deftly dodging me. "You _are_ a curious one, aren't you?"

"Cat," I said, pointing to my chest with a claw. "What is that?"

She stepped back from the counter. "I wanted this to be ready when you got home."

I felt my green feline eyes widen. Behind her was a top-of-the-line Keurig, the one that accepted pods but could also make several different types of espresso beverages. My eyes flipped back to Marinette. "Princess, that's-"

"The least I can do," she said. "And before you go worrying about how much it cost me, I got it through my father with his steep discount at the equipment supplier he uses." She laughed slightly. "I know how much you subsist on coffee. I figured it might as well be high quality."

"What an extraordinarily thoughtful surprise," I breathed. "Thank you."

She drew me into a hug. "Happy Valentine's Day, Chaton."

I buried my head into her soft hair. "Here's to many more, mon cherie."


	46. Cold Kitty

**Forty-Six: Cold Kitty**

_Author's Note: As spring dawns over Paris, Chat is suddenly reminded of Marinette's second encounter with adult Bunnix and decides to press for more answers._

* * *

"No changes at all," Bunnix said as she leaned on her umbrella. "The timeline is as it should be. At least," she added with a smile, "for the time being."

I rolled my feline eyes from where I was perched on a railing. "Puns are more my department, Bunny."

"That's Bunnix to you, Chat," the rabbit-themed holder laughed.

"Potato, Po-tah-to," I smiled.

Ladybug pressed a gloved hand to her face, and I laughed again. The three of us were atop one of the older rows of townhomes in the city at a meeting called by Ladybug. It was mid-April and we still had not found so much as a trace of the Miracle Box we had been searching for since New Year's Day. We were starting to throw up every Hail Mary in the book, including asking Bunnix to re-check the timeline. There was an outside chance Manon was an artifact of a timeline adjustment, but our teammate had just confirmed that wasn't the case.

"Thanks for researching just the same," Ladybug sighed. "I guess at this point, we'll just have to wait for Hawmoth's next move."

"It might give us something," I nodded. "Though I am starting to wonder if it truly exists."

"I won't discount that possibility," Ladybug sighed again. "But it does seem unlikely given how many Miraculous we recovered from her."

"I know," I said, tail twitching. "A cat can hope."

"I've got to hop," Bunnix interjected. "Unless you need something else from me?"

"No, not at all. Thanks," Ladybug smiled tiredly. The search and lack of evidence had been dragging her down, especially the last month or so as the treasure hunt had taken on the feeling of fruitlessness.

"See you around, then," Bunnix waved as she flipped over the edge of the roof and sailed away using her umbrella.

I watched her go, and thought aloud: "She's not far from the age when we saw her the first time, is she?"

"No," Ladybug said. "Within a year or two I would think."

I looked at my partner. "Do you think we are close to the moment, then?" I asked.

"Which one?" she replied a bit tiredly.

I slid off the railing and pulled her to me. "When Bunnix visited us all those years ago, we found out there was _another_ Hawkmoth. That by definition means we must have defeated the current one, right?"

Ladybug looked at me. "I hadn't thought about that, but yeah, you're right. Maybe this Miraculous Box we're hunting for plays a larger role than we realized."

"We'll find it," I said as I kissed her hair. "Don't worry."

"I know," she replied. "Come one, let's get home."

"Uh," I said. "Can I ask you something first?"

Ladybug looked up at me. "Chat, it's been a _really _long day. Get me a glass of wine and _then_ ask me questions."

"Fine. I'll race you to the apartment," I laughed as I vaulted into the air. "Last one home has to make dinner!"

"You're on!" she cried as she tossed her yo-yo to the sky and zip lined away from me.

In the end, it wasn't really a fair fight; though we were evenly matched, I was hung up on the rooftop opposite my balcony entrance, waiting for the neighbors in the apartment below us to go inside. Ladybug apparently had no such trouble, as a gloating Marinette informed me when I rolled out into the kitchen from my bedroom.

"Fortunately," I said as I narrowed my masked eyes at my girlfriend who was lounging at the breakfast bar, the bottle of red already open and decanted into two glasses, "I accounted for just such a possibility."

"Did you, now?" she asked, eyes twinkling.

"Yes," I said as I leapt over her and the wine and into the kitchen proper, landing in front of the fridge. Opening the freezer, I pulled out a turkey meatloaf from a few weeks earlier and went about getting it ready to go into the oven. Once that was warming up slowly, I pulled the bag of fresh fingerling potatoes from the pantry and began to scrub them under the faucet of the sink, using my claws to peel them. "Mashed, scalloped or whipped?" I asked.

"Mashed."

"Butter?"

"Absolutely," she said as she sipped again. "Did you wash those paws of yours before peeling the potatoes?"

"Yes," I laughed. "I think I have green beans or peas," I continued as I arranged the spuds in a pot and topped them with water for boiling, then placed them on the stove.

"Beans."

"Okay," I said as I went back to the fridge and pulled out the fresh green beans I'd picked up at the farmers market earlier in the week.

Draining the last of her glass, Marinette poured another and then looked to me. "What did you want to ask me?" she queried as she took another sip.

I paused, beans in one paw. "Why did Bunnix visit you a second time? And why don't I remember anything about it?"

The glass slipped out of her hand and smashed on the granite counter, sending waves of wine and shards of glass everywhere. I dropped the beans into the sink and instantly was by her side, holding her; to my surprise, she was shaking violently. "Mari?" I asked quietly. "What is it?"

"I've tried for years to put that whole incident out of my mind," Marinette replied softly.

Carefully, I carried her over to our couch, easily hopping over in a single leap to gently land on my back. Holding her close to me, I held my head to hers, purring gently. "Take a deep breath," I said, shocked to see tears in her eyes. "We'll just sit here like this for a bit."

Shaking, and then sobbing, Marinette curled up against me, and gripped me like there was no tomorrow. I held her against me lightly, more curious than ever as to what had transpired during this mythical other visit from Bunnix I couldn't recall having taken place. It was fortunate the meatloaf was on a really low temperature and I'd not set the pot of potatoes to boil, for it took more than an hour for the shaking to stop.

"Princess?" I asked softly as I nuzzled her head affectionately. "How are you feeling?"

Marinette took a shaky breath. "Sad. Angry. Depressed." She turned her head toward me. "And grateful for every moment we have together."

My masked eyes widened. "Marinette," I said carefully. "That's the kind of thing you say when time is growing short." I shifted slightly so I could see her whole face. "If there's something I should know—"

Marinette smiled slightly as she pressed a finger to my lips. "I'm fine, and you're fine," she said softly. "And as far as I know, nothing is about to fall out of the sky to change that, short of Hawkmoth making an unexpected run at us."

"Which would be just like him." I narrowed my masked eyes at her. "Your shivering and, dare I say delicately, rather emotional reaction to the name of our Miraculous team member would argue otherwise."

Her deep blue eyes were still moist from the crying, but I could feel she was over the worst of the storm. Leaning her head against my chest again, she pressed a hand to my heart. "Such a reassuring feeling," she said. "Feeling it pulse, just below your costume."

"It only beats for you," I reminded her.

"I know," she laughed. "Bunnix…" she started again. "She did visit a second time that same year we saw her during the TimeTagger akuma."

My ears went up. "Why don't I remember that?" I asked, before a cold shiver run through my body. "Oh," I said very, very softly. "It was about _me_, wasn't it? That's why you said what you said just now."

"You _are_ one perceptive kitty," she chuckled again. "Yeah, it was about you but more about me. I made a colossal mistake and nearly ended the world."

I hugged her closer. "That's not even remotely possible," I reassured her. "Besides, unless this is some sort of fantastic afterlife, we appear to very much be in the here-and-now."

"I fixed it in the end," she replied. "Which is why Bunnix appeared; she discovered I went off script, apparently."

"All right, I'll scratch that post. What did you do?"

She pushed herself off of me and stood, then went to the floor-to-ceiling windows facing the Eiffel Tower. At that hour, dusk had descended, and the lights had begun to appear, illuminating the metallic superstructure. Normally, I would move to be by her side, but somehow, it felt like the right move was to stay lounging on the couch, catlike.

"You remember the gift your fan club gave you?"

That made me laugh. "Which one? I would remind you I _still_ have fan clubs, numbering in the hundreds."

Still facing away, she answered. "The Brazilian one."

A mental image of a hat that matched the t-shirt Father had insisted I wear nearly every day of my school career popped into my fur brain. "Actually, I do remember that club. And that hat." I paused. "How could I forget? You delivered it purrsonally."

Marinette slumped slightly. "It was actually _from_ me."

My ears and masked eyebrows went up, and I nodded slightly. "You know, I wondered about that. I mean, regardless of what you had told me that day, I assumed it was _Ladybug_ that had given it to me, not having a clue who was under that cute mask of yours. I have to admit, it set my heart aflame all over again."

Mari looked over her shoulder. "I know. You were a terrible pest for weeks afterward, but I never connected why Chat was suddenly so much _more_ over the top than usual."

I shrugged. "Secret identities suck. Just saying."

She turned back to the window, and hugged herself. "I don't exactly know how, but the _first_ time I gave you the gift, it set into motion a chain of events that landed me in some sort of post-apocalyptic version of Paris." Staring at her reflection for a bit, she continued. "The Chat I met there had been… damaged. But he also knew who I was, under the mask."

"Was I…?" I started, not quite willing to ask the next question. Visions of me as anything other than the Chat Noir I had always been turned my stomach. "Did I come after you?" I finally asked, before adding in a slight burst of inspiration. "Was I akumatized?"

"Yes to both," she said softly. "You became Chat Blanc, victim of a horrific choice Hawkmoth had to have forced upon you." She turned halfway toward me again. "I don't know all of it, and Bunnix was unwilling to divulge anything. Near as I can determine, though, that version of you somehow managed to resist whatever it was Hawkmoth wanted you to do. Unfortunately… the price you paid was destroying the entire planet and killing everyone upon it."

My heart was thumping in my chest. "Everyone…?" I asked so quietly, Marinette had to step closer.

"Yes," she said as she slipped back into my embrace. "Paris was flooded, and in the process of fighting Chat Blanc, I tried to get away from him by diving from what was left of the Eiffel Tower and into the water below. Meters below the surface, I came across Ladybug standing next to Hawkmoth. Both of us were quite, quite dead."

I swallowed.

"It wasn't easy, but I managed to find the akuma and get you back, and then Bunnix returned me to my time. My Lucky Charm was an eraser," she smiled. "So you might be able to guess the rest."

"The smudge on the gift," I rasped.

"Exactly. That was enough to make sure the timeline reset." She settled against me. "I came away from that experience assuming there was no way we would ever be able to know our true identities, for I was certain that somehow, Hawkmoth had used that against you." Marinette looked up at me. "The Chat I met in that now non-existent future was desperately in love with me. And despite everything, I knew it was a deep, true love. I have no idea how long that Chat and the other version of me had been together, but my sense of it was long enough that they had a bond Hawkmoth thought he could leverage."

"But you let me visit you!" I cried. "Even knowing what had happened, you encouraged me to visit the Bakery. I fell in love with you _anyway_."

She smiled. "It occurred to me that I'd been looking at it wrong. Love wasn't something that could be weaponized. Love was _protection_. A defense against everything Hawkmoth stands for." Snuggling into me, she said even more softly. "I wasn't sure if I felt the same about you, Chat; certainly not in the beginning, when I was hot to trot for your alter-ego. But given what I had seen of Chat Blanc, I at least wanted to give you the chance."

Putting my paws around her and hugging her close, I thought about that for a moment. "That was pretty bold," I said after a moment. "Knowing that it had gone wrong – horrifically wrong – the first time."

"I trusted you, Chat. And trusted that love _done right_ would win every time." She sat up and turned to look at me. "I don't deny that you had feelings for me back when we were teenagers. But looking back at it now, can you honestly say you were in love with Ladybug, or with the _idea_ of Ladybug?"

Nodding slowly, I reached up to brush back her hair. "In my defense, it was a starting point. What we have today was seeded by my feelings from then."

"Fair enough," she smiled. "Our relationship," she continued as she laced her fingers with my gloved ones, "the one we have today, is built upon sturdier stuff than the one that led to Chat Blanc."

"You could have told me about this long ago," I said. "There was no reason for you to bear the burden alone."

"Probably not," she nodded. "I've been so happy with you, any thought of that terrible visit to a future that thankfully hasn't come to pass was one that I shelved in the 'forget about it' cupboard."

I looked at her. "You are still worried that it might happen."

"Yeah," she replied. "I suspect anyone under enough emotional pressure would fall victim to Hawkmoth – not just a feline," she quickly added. "I could be just as vulnerable. Say we have a knockdown, drag out fight; maybe we split up on bad terms. Under different circumstances, it could well be me sitting on the Eiffel Tower, looking across the wasteland of what had been my city."

"No," I said firmly. "No, I don't think either one of us could wind up there now. I'm not that Chat from back then, and you aren't the Marinette of old."

Marinette laughed. "Thanks, I think."

"You know what I mean," I said, smiling. "We've grown. We know what Hawkmoth does now. We know what kind of power we actually wield. And," I smiled again, "we know who _we_ are. That makes all the difference."

"All true," she laughed. "All true. Hawkmoth is a wily adversary, though," she reminded me softly. "We can't know what he might throw at us. How he might try to use our love for each other against us."

I nodded. "Now I understand why you've wanted to keep our relationship on the down low."

"It was to protect us, Chat," she sighed. "I fear my desire to come clean with you will actually put us into greater danger."

"Forearmed is forewarned, I suppose. I don't deny, though, that where you are concerned, my decisions are not totally rational."

"Same here," she sighed again. "The only thing that saves us, I guess, is that we are expecting him to eventually find out and try to twist it to his advantage."

"Which he will."

"Undoubtedly."

We held each other for a bit before I broke the silence. "We can get through whatever he throws at us, Milady. With my enhanced powers, and your brilliance, he doesn't stand a chance."

Marinette chuckled. "I wish I had your optimism."

"I have enough for both of us," I said as I hugged her one more time before wrinkling my feline nose at the acrid smell slowly filling the apartment. "Now, if you'll excuse me… I think I need to make a new meatloaf."


	47. May Showers

**Forty-Seven: May Showers**

_Author's Note: Chat has to adjust on the fly when is lunch plans go awry._

* * *

There were very few meetings I looked forward to at House of Gabriel.

For the most part, that was because they invariably involved Father (or, as I found our staff had begun to call him, iGabriel due to his penchant for appearing only on a tablet). As I soared through the brilliant morning sky of Paris on my morning commute to the office, it struck me how much more comfortable I'd become expressing my opinion since becoming the number two guy nearly a year earlier. Most of our meetings wound up devolving into a pointed disagreement over the strangest things – last week, it had been over the shape of a button on a blouse that was part of the teen fall portfolio – but to be honest, as Chat Noir, I had faced challenges with far more at stake. Staring down Father over a few thousand dollars on a design was nothing by comparison.

Who knew wielding a Miraculous could be so effective as an internship tool?

Hooking a claw on an antenna aerial to quickly shift directions, I smiled my special Chat smile for today's meeting was with our liaison to Chateau Le Blanc. Helicoptering over an alleyway with my baton, I smirked a little at the gossip I knew had begun to run rampant within House of Gabriel, for Marinette had been sighted increasingly frequently in the building; technically, it had more to due with the logistics of pulling off a co-branded product release, but optically no one could dispute that it seemed as though the heir to the empire was smitten with the junior designer assigned to the project.

Far be it for me to correct them.

I'm sure it didn't help my case that I'd asked my assistant to book the meeting over lunch in my private conference room, with catering from a particular bakery. When my girlfriend found out about my preparations, though, she raised an eyebrow and warned me about appearances.

"Sooner or later we need to get Adrien and Marinette together," I'd reminded her as I'd sipped my last cup of coffee preparatory to vaulting out the window for my commute. My masked eyes had narrowed. "Unless you _want_ to keep me encased in skintight magic black leather for the rest of my life."

"A girl can dream," she laughed wickedly as she trailed a finger along my arm on her way out the door.

Landing on a secluded part of the rooftop, I dropped my transformation as I pulled open the door to the stairwell, tossing Plagg his taxi fare in the process. He managed to down two slices before I emerged in a side hallway outside of the executive floor, for all appearances engrossed in my cell phone. I met my assistant in the doorway to my office suite and immediately noted his frown.

"This can't be good," I said to Tomas.

"It's not," he replied, and I realized immediately how stressed he was. It was rare for his Latin accent to bleed through into his French; combined with how more tousled than normal his brown hair was, my stomach started to ache. "Your father is insisting that we shuffle the photo shoot today. The weather forecast isn't favorable this afternoon – rain, I guess – and given that it's for the weekend fashion spread…"

I sighed. "How badly does it kill my day?"

Tomas paused and then put a hand to his face, allowing his long bangs to fall forward.

"Ah," I sighed again.

"I'm so sorry, Adrien," he mumbled through his fingers. "Flipping the budget meeting and the design meeting to accommodate the new shooting schedule leaves you with about fifteen minutes to eat. Period."

I laughed. "That's one way to ensure I keep my svelte form."

"I didn't—" his face shot up, worry in his eyes.

"Kidding," I said. "I know you look out for me, Tomas. I appreciate it."

"I'll call Chateau Le Blanc, then," he said sadly as he walked around his desk and picked up the phone. "And cancel the catering."

I paused at the threshold to my inner office. "Where is the photoshoot, anyway?"

He looked down at his tablet and then looked up, a smile forming on his face. "Oddly, the park by the Dupain-Cheng Bakery."

I couldn't help the sly Chat smile appeared on my face. "Shove the budget meeting to one and shorten it to thirty minutes."

Tomas looked up, and slowly smiled. "That'll still only give you forty-five minutes."

"I'll take it."

* * *

Half past eleven found me cozily ensconced against Marinette, masked eyes closed and purring set to eleven as she gently rubbed along one edge of a feline ear. The tension from the photoshoot had dissipated immediately beneath her tender touch, and I smiled a bit at how I hard I had pressed to wrap the thing in record time. I mean, really, when you have a chance to lounge with your girlfriend atop one of the best Bakeries in Paris, munching on freshly made morsels, it really a hard decision, was it?

I'd cancelled my car and had "walked" to the photoshoot from the office; landing on a rooftop along the way allowed me to call Marinette from the baton and reschedule our meeting to be more personal lunch appointment with my favorite designer – if she was amenable to the change. She was, with one interesting twist of ensuring I emphasized the purr in personal. As usual, I could deny her nothing and readily agreed with her terms.

Normally a two minute walk a best from the park to the Bakery, it had taken me ten precious minutes to escape from the set as Adrien in order to walk two blocks in the wrong direction before transforming. Then it had by necessity been a circuitous route through the skies of Paris to further cover my tracks; the only upshot had been seeing our lunch carefully laid out and ready to go when I landed atop my favorite conical chimney. Pressed for time as we were, I should have realized my girlfriend would have planned accordingly and quickly vaulted down to dig into the food, more famished than I realized from the morning's exercises.

Somewhat later, I languidly stretched a paw up to halfheartedly play with the ribbon Marinette had used for her ponytail that morning. "This would have been easier if we were officially a couple," I said lazily, trying hard to fight off my pressing feline desire to sleep off the wonderful bread bowl chili we'd dined upon. Sabine knew it was one of Chat's favorite dishes and had apparently adjusted the menu when Marinette's lunch date with Adrien was ostensibly cancelled. "Not that I mind transforming, of course."

"I know," Mari said as she switched focus to my other ear.

The sensation of her touch turned me into a puddle of goo as always, and I struggled a bit to remain in the moment. "About the meeting we're having right now," I said, trying to stay professional despite my loud purring and immediate desire to cuddle even closer to her. "The numbers in your email were exceptional. I was impressed at how quickly the… oh, wow…" I trailed off, caught up again in her ministrations. "I don't know if it's cool that you know how pliable the co-CEO of House of Gabriel becomes when you do that," I observed as I sighed contentedly.

"It's part of Chateau Le Blanc's master plan to do a hostile takeover," she laughed as she leaned down for a kiss.

"Deviously brilliant," I admitted.

Pushing me up so she could slide off the chaise lounge, I rolled into a cat-crouch at her feet and tried not to look put out that she had stopped paying attention to me. "About that," she continued as she stepped to the carafe of hot coffee to warm up her mug. "As good as that line is doing, as a whole Chateau Le Blanc is still struggling."

My feline ears went up and I stopped purring. "How bad?"

"I don't know all the details – I'm not as high in the executive food chain as you are," she smiled as she sipped from the steaming mug. "What I am hearing from my boss, though, is that our line of credit is maxed and we are running short on cash." She looked to the sky. "HR is already preparing pink slips for some of the design staff."

I stood and pulled her to me. "Are you-?" I started, my masked eyes wide with concern.

"No," she said quickly. "My role with House of Gabriel is probably all that's saving me at this point." She paused for a moment, her deep blue eyes betraying her worry. "Our joint product line has to succeed, kitty. Otherwise, we're done."

"Mari, why didn't you tell me this sooner?" I asked, cupping her face with my paw. "I had no idea things were so bad."

She smiled and pressed her hand to the back of my paw. "You have enough on your plate as it is," she said softly. "And until this morning, I was unaware of the full extent of our financial problems."

Stroking her hair, I reminded myself yet again how much rested on the petite shoulders of my girlfriend. As if moonlighting as a superhero weren't enough, now she was quite probably also going to have to save her company, too. Fortunately, she had a partner incredibly vested in her success – on both fronts. "All right," I said softly as I leaned down to kiss her. "I have some meetings this afternoon that might actually be useful, now that I know about this."

Mari sighed. "I don't know what can be done. We can't _make_ people buy stuff they don't want."

I stared at her for a moment, seized with inspiration. She caught the narrowing of my masked eyes and the smile that slowly spread across my face.

"What…?" she asked.

"Maybe that is the problem," I laughed, a plan starting to form within the portion of my brain reserved for House of Gabriel business. "People want your stuff. They just don't know it yet."

"Kitty…" she started, smiling slightly. "You have that look in your eyes."

I smiled wider. "What look?" I asked innocently as I leapt away from her and balanced on the railing. "I've got to scat; an executive's job is never done, and I have a busy afternoon ahead of me…"


	48. Stitching a Burst Seam

**Forty-Eight: Stitching a Burst Seam**

_Author's Note: Chat – well, technically Adrien – puts a plan in motion to try and pump up sales of Chateau Le Blanc's new line. However, he gets an unexpected reaction when he shares his idea with Ladybug. _

* * *

"I need a favor," I said, my tail swishing behind and below me.

Alya was leaning her hands on the railing beside where I was perched, a partial smile on her face. My feline hearing could just pick up the sounds of Nino humming as he tweaked another mix, blissfully unaware that his girlfriend was chatting with me. "Is this some sort of penance for those photos I took of you and Ladybug?" she teased.

I narrowed my masked eyes at her. "I've never been a vindictive kitty, fox," I reminded her with a slight smile. "But you do kinda owe me. I did save you and your fiancé from a fate worse than death."

"Uh, didn't Ladybug have a role there, too?" she asked, barely able to keep her laughter contained.

"Yes," I nodded gravely. "And when she comes to collect her portion of your debt…"

Rolling her eyes, Alya finally started to chuckle. "Of course. What do you need?"

"Well," I said as I slid out my baton and popped it open. Plagg had walked me though how to connect it to my corporate calendar at House of Gabriel so that, for better or worse, I could stay on schedule. "I need you to be in the gardens surrounding the Grand Palais on Tuesday, say around nine?"

"Why?" she asked, and I could see her inner journalist starting to rev up.

"A friend of mine needs a bit of a boost," I said. "I could only think of one person that would possibly be able to help get the word out for her."

"Do I know this friend of yours?" Alya asked.

"Yes," I winked. "But she would kill me if she knew I had come to you."

Alya nodded, a smile forming. "I'm a journalist, Chat. Not a mass-marketer."

"I know," I smiled.

She frowned. "I'm not sure I understand what you want, then."

"Come to the Grand Palais," I said. "Watch what happens. If you choose to write about it, great. If you don't see anything worth exploring, that's fine, too."

"This is a very strange, very flexible favor you are asking," she said as she crossed her arms. "Let me ask you this: what are you _hoping_ I will do? When I see whatever it is you think I am gonna see?"

"Honestly?" I asked. "I don't know yet. Something magical, I hope."

Alya rolled her eyes. "Lovely. This is the _worst_ assignment I've ever gotten, professionally."

"I don't think it will be," I smiled as I extended the baton to leap away. "Tuesday? At nine?"

"I'll be there."

Satisfied that my friend was on the hook, I smiled and leapt away into the early evening, sunset at my back. I caught an extended feline shadow as it crossed the sidewalk below, and for a moment I was a young, brash kitten again. Landing on the roof opposite, I danced my way across the tile to a tune only I could hear, smiling widely as my shadow followed my every move. Twisting, turning, leaping into the air – the late Spring evening had put me into a fantastic mood. Not that I wasn't normally ebullient, for my heart always lifted each time I was on my way to rendezvous with Milady.

Patrol night had taken on an entirely different meaning in the months since discovering each other's true identities. Sure, we were still out keeping a watchful eye for nefariousness courtesy of Hawkmoth, but in truth it became something of a legal date night for our Chat and Ladybug personas. How long I had fantasized of such a situation during those years when I'd been crushing hard on my partner! And now, here I was, dream turned reality.

How could I _not_ be in a good mood?

Tonight, Ladybug had picked her favorite perch hallway up the Eiffel Tower for our meeting location. Carefully, I wound my way over the still thick crowds on the grand plaza surrounding the marvelous structure, trying not to draw too much attention to the fact a superhero was in the area. It hardly ever worked, though, if the sheer number of photos I would invariably find on the internet were any indication. Alya of course was the chief purveyor of Miraculous photos, but she had stiff competition from any Parisian with a smartphone and access to Instagram.

Landing on the side of one leg of the Tower, I quickly leapt from beam to beam, working my way up the tower, tail snapping back and forth as I moved. I'd done the climb so often that it now felt like second nature; I even had come to recognize each massive bolt I passed, for they all seemed to have an individualized profile. Some had scratches, oddly, especially given their height (and _not_ from my claws, mind you); others had unique rust patterns or flaking paint that made them unique and memorable. And none of it was visible unless you were capable of hoisting yourself up the side of the monument as a human-sized feline.

Hooking a claw in the final beam, I went for showy and flipped myself up and over the edge of the beam where Ladybug was waiting, did a double-barrel in mid-air and then landed in my crouch beside my partner in polka-dots. Looking up at her, I smiled. "Evening, Milady."

Ladybug tried and failed not to smile, then started a slow golf-clap as she slid over toward me. "I'd give it an eight out of ten," she said as she scratched behind a feline ear.

I tried to look surprised, which is really hard to pull off when you are leaning into ear scratches and have your eyes scrunched shut in pure bliss. "Only an eight?" I asked, my purring starting to ramp up. "What did I do wrong?"

"Nothing."

"Nothing? Then why not a ten?"

Ladybug chuckled. "I need to give you a reason to keep striving for purrfection," she said.

"I think I've already found that," I said, leaning hard enough into her hand that I wound up with my chin on her shoulder, masked feline eyes locked on her blue ones.

"Flatterer."

"No," I said, smiling. "Just the truth. Plain and simple."

"You are an incurable romantic," my girlfriend sighed as she kissed me between the ears. "But we still need to patrol."

"Yes we do," I agreed, but not before nuzzling her with the tip of my nose. "Which route tonight?"

"We've not gone past the Stadium in a while," she replied. "Let's do that loop."

"Okay," I said as I reluctantly pulled away from her; the exotic fragrance that was Ladybug but also Marinette lingered for just a moment, reminding me of something. "Say," I asked as I stood up. "How exactly were you able to mask your scent from me?"

Ladybug smiled. "Magic," was all she said as she tossed her yo-yo out and zipped into the gathering darkness ahead of me.

* * *

The first part of our big circle around Paris was, thankfully, uneventful. So much so that I convinced Ladybug to take a (literal) coffee break on top of the Palais de la Porte Dorée. There was a café close at hand where Chat was a frequent patron, and soon we were sipping some divine lattes as we overlooked the Parc Zoologique de Paris. The sounds of the animals as they were settling in for the evening made me think of Alya's father, a keeper at the famous facility; that, in turn, reminded me of my agreement with the journalist, which caused a wide Chat grin to break out upon my masked visage.

"What is that for?" Ladybug asked.

I turned toward my girlfriend, unexpectedly caught off guard. Scrambling a bit, I smiled a bit more and inclined my wild mane toward the Zoo. "I was just remembering how you locked Alya and Nino into a cage over there – and how they've been together ever since."

She laughed. "That was a long time ago now. And it was for their own good," she added defensively.

"I believe they would both agree with that assessment."

Ladybug looked at me. "Isn't it funny," she said quietly as she shifted her mug to her other gloved hand and intertwined the free one with my paw. "That was such a disaster that day."

"Yeah," I nodded. "The akuma was pretty bad, too."

"It was," she smiled. "I do believe that was the first time you sniffed me, too."

I flushed slightly. "Was it?" I asked unconvincingly. She wasn't wrong – I hadn't been Chat Noir very long at that point, and had just been getting the hang of my enhanced senses. I might have been a tad… overzealous… in cataloguing Ladybug's unique scent while we'd been holed up in the Bakery that afternoon.

"Yes," Ladybug smirked.

"Sorry," I said. "But can you blame me? You. Me. Hiding out together…"

Ladybug laughed. "My parents watching us…"

"It _was_ a bit of a buzzkill," I sighed. "But we've made up for it since."

"That we have." She took a sip. "I've been meaning to ask you, Chat… it's been a few days since you bounded away from me exclaiming you had a plan for selling more of my designs."

"Hey now," I said with mock seriousness. "No discussing work while we're working."

"This is _work_?" she asked. "You enjoy being Chat too much for this to be work."

"I enjoy being Chat _for you_," I corrected. "That makes all the work I do – as Chat or Adrien – worth it."

"Thank you," she smiled. "And yet, I still want to know what your plans are. You've been annoyingly coy about it. Almost as if you were fighting an akuma that you didn't want to guess your next move."

"Which is, like, each and every time I fight one."

"The point remains," she continued, a faint note of exasperation in her voice.

"We used to keep secrets from each other all the time," I reminded her sweetly. "It never bothered you before."

"Are you kidding? It drove me _insane_. But I accepted it as part of the gig."

"It's supposed to be a surprise," I demurred.

Ladybug rolled her eyes. "Really? We're gonna do this the hard way, then?"

"What do you mean-"

In a swift movement, Ladybug wrapped me in her yo-yo and pulled me to her. Before I could express any shock at what had been my latte as it slipped over the edge of the rooftop, lost forever, she had deftly begun gently tracing the outline of a feline ear with a gloved finger. "Tell me," she said simply.

I managed to grit my teeth and hold out for a full four seconds before my purring overwhelmed the street noise below and I once more sagged into her lap, a contented kitty pliant to any request. "That was low," I said softly but with no malice. "You know I can't resist that."

"Heaven help any akuma that finds out. Now, spill."

I sighed. "All I'll say is this: House of Gabriel is having an unusual pre-summer fashion show next Tuesday. Highlighting an exciting new line of clothing for teens and young professionals."

"House of Gabriel?" she asked, finger paused in midair. "You guys have something new?"

"No," I said. "Chateau Le Blanc does. And it will be all over the news."

She looked at me for a moment, and I watched the color drain out of her face. "Not… not my….?"

"Yes!" I replied happily. "I can't wait to-"

"Whaaaaat!" Ladybug screeched. "A show! On Tuesday?! _This_ Tuesday?!"

Shocked, I sat up (as best as I could do, still embraced by the yo-yo as I was). "Yeah," I replied tentatively. "I… I didn't expect that reaction."

"And I suppose you're going to be the primary model!" she said eyes wide. "OhmyGodIneedtogethome!" she said breathlessly.

"Ladybug?" I asked with concern. "I thought you'd be excited-oof!"

In a swift movement, she unrolled me from the yo-yo, sending me tumbling across the roof. I flipped up into my cat crouch facing my girlfriend who appeared to be very close to hyperventilating. Majorly concerned, I leapt to her side and pulled her into my chest, trying to follow the babbling issuing forth from Ladybug. "-can't—can't-" she said between gasps before finally dissolving into tears and sobbing.

"Hey-hey-hey," I said softly as I stroked her hair with a claw. "Take a deep breath, Milady," I continued, starting to purr slightly to try and soften the moment and blunt the worst of what was the first ever panic attack I'd witnessed from Ladybug.

As I stood there with my shaking partner, I finally connected the dots and realized just how much stress my girlfriend was under at the moment. Not only was she diligently trying to make a name for herself at Chateau Le Blanc, as the project manager for the relationship between our two firms, she was under incredible pressure to make the partnership profitable for her bosses. As I was now deducing, my brilliant idea of having a fashion show in just a few day's time – with all that entails – just seemingly tripled her workload at the worst possible time.

It took a while, but ultimately I felt the tension leave the petite frame of my partner as we stood there under the stars. I just kept purring and hugging and wishing I hadn't screwed up again.

"I knew something was wrong," I said once she was breathing normally again. "You hid how bad things were from me pretty well. I'm sorry," I added as I buried my masked face in her hair. "I didn't follow my instincts to find out why you were so stressed. I can cancel it—"

"No," Ladybug said somewhat forcefully as she turned her red eyes up to me. "No, your heart was in the right place as always, kitty. And you aren't wrong – such a splashy presentation will vault us into better visibility." She pressed her head against my chest. "It's just such a short timeline, with so much work. I think it overwhelmed me for a moment."

"Hey now," I said, turning her chin up. "We're still partners, aren't we?"

"Yes?" she answered a bit quizzically.

"This and in all things – I'm here for you. Whatever it takes, I'll always do everything I can to make you successful. Including," I grinned as I brushed back a hair from her mask, "endless hours of fitting. And uncorking the overtime for the seamstresses at House of Gabriel."

Ladybug's eyes widened. "Your Father won't approve," she said. "And we have our own staff."

"You don't have Millicent and her crew," I replied. "I once saw them whip up a three-piece suit for the President of France in less than half a day." I smiled a bit. "And I can be charming when I need to be."

"Don't I know it." She looked at me, hard. "They are _already_ working on the outfits, aren't they?"

"I already have your designs," I reminded her. "You didn't actually think I'd leave you adrift, did you?"

"No," she said, then added a bit sheepishly, "maybe just a little."

I hugged her closer again. "Never in a million years, bugaboo. Ever."

She laughed. "I thought you'd stopped calling me that."

"I hold it in reserve for moments like this," I said, putting a claw to the welcome smile on her face. "So I can see that shine."

Shaking her head, she pulled back. "All right, alley cat. Then we'd better wrap up patrol. You're going to give your Keurig a workout tonight – I've got some thoughts about one of those ensembles I brought home. If I get the final changes done overnight, your crack team can pull it together for me to review tomorrow night."

"Deal," I said as I readied my baton.

"This will work?" she asked as she paused on the edge of the rooftop.

"Yes," I said with confidence. "Just like everything else you do, this will be a smashing success."

"I'm glad you have enough faith in me for the both of us," she called out as she ziplined away.

"That's my job, Milady," I said quietly as I sailed out after the beautiful form of my girlfriend.


	49. Nine Sharp

**Forty-Nine: Nine Sharp**

_Author's Note: Despite being on a twenty-four hour clock in France, Alya realizes Chat never specified whether the function at the Grand Palais was in the morning… or late evening. The answer comes from an unexpected source._

* * *

_Special note: I don't normally insert a POV change in the middle of a story, but my dear friend MalcolmReynolds made an astute point in the comments from the prior chapter. My original snarky response turned into a short interlude of a chapter instead – because, well, why not? -ep_

* * *

Alya slid the door to the balcony shut, slightly muting the glow of the setting sun. Turning, she could see the receding form of Chat Noir soaring over the skyline of Paris; her frown at his unusual favor softened as she watched him gracefully dance across the rooftops. Chat's movements had such a pure expression of joy to it that she found herself actually chuckling softly at the sight. He could really be a goofball at times, but she also couldn't deny just how in love he was with Marinette. It was infused into every part of his being, making her extremely happy for her best friend of many years.

She felt an arm snug around her waist and she turned to see Nino by her side. "Do they need us for something?" he asked.

Alya shook her head. "Not exactly," she replied, her hand automatically going to the Fox Miraculous at her neck. She was struck by the faith Ladybug still had in her despite what had transpired a few months earlier with Manon. "Chat wants me to cover an event at the Grand Palais on Tuesday."

"Really?" Nino's eyebrows went up. "Is he expecting trouble?"

"That's the funny part," she sighed. "He wasn't very specific. Chat wants me to be there around nine, but now that I think about it, he wasn't specific about whether it was a morning event or some black-tie high roller event. I think he's got something cooking for Marinette, though, so it might… what?" Alya caught the look on her fiancé's face.

"_Next_ Tuesday?" he asked with that half smile she adored.

"Yeah," Alya nodded as she looked at him askance. "In the gardens."

Nino smiled wider. "It's unusual for me to be in the know and scoop you, my love."

"Spill it," she said pointedly.

"House of Gabriel called earlier and booked me to do the runway music for a fashion show next Tuesday. Nine a.m. sharp at the Grand Palais." Nino rocked on his toes. "Adrien personally asked for me. They are rolling out a new line as part their partnership with Chateau Le Blanc."

Alya's eyes widened. "House of Gab—" she started, before turning back and catching (literally) the tail end of Chat as he disappeared over a building and into the sunset. Long forgotten puzzle pieces suddenly snapped into place, and she felt the dawn of recognition.

"Uh oh," Nino said. "I've seen that look before."

She swung her head around, the waves of her hair shifting at the movement. "What look?"

"The one where a story gets ahold of you." His eyes followed hers to where Chat had been. "Are you sure you want to follow that one?" he continued softly. "After everything they've done for Paris? For us?"

Alya looked back out the window and felt the answer in her soul. "No," she smiled. "I think that's one mystery I am happy to leave a mystery." She turned back to Nino, and pushed his hat back so she could run a hand over his rather sexy shaved head. "I owe them – _him_ – at least that much."


	50. Turtle's Torment

**Fifty: Turtle's Torment**

_Author's Note: Out late after helping Marinette prepare for the fashion show, Chat encounters an agitated Carapace roaming the night skies of Paris long after hours._

* * *

Much to my chagrin, even with the help of my peerless seamstresses, Marinette and I wound up working around the clock prepping for the fashion show I had committed us to; at one point, somewhere around three in the morning on Tuesday, I'd lost track of just how many outfits I had put on and taken off. I couldn't even remember the last time I'd eaten, let alone enjoyed a cup of coffee. Seeing myself in the three-way mirror, I noted the puffy eyes and hint of dark circles around them that my makeup artist would work overtime to hide in just a few hours' time.

I stepped off the raised platform and wandered over to Marinette. At that hour, there were just a handful of people in the cavernous design studio at House of Gabriel, and I leaned down to put my chin on her shoulder. For a moment, we were alone. "How are you doing, Princess?" I asked as I nuzzled her ear with my nose.

"_Adrien_," Marinette emphasized without looking up, "you're getting a little too familiar."

Startled, I belatedly realized I was standing there in Gabriel boxer briefs, not feline ears and a domino mask. I took a respectful step back and reached for my robe, reminding myself as I knotted the belt that we still had a bit to go before our civilian selves could be an official couple. "Sorry," I whispered as I leaned around her again. "I'm more tired than I realized."

"You're forgiven," she laughed quietly as she made a final adjustment just as one of my seamstresses appeared. "That's it, Julie," she sighed as she sat back. "Last one."

"On it," the small grandmotherly woman said as she whisked the outfit from my girlfriend's hands and disappeared into the darkened space.

I looked after her. "Is that truly the last one?"

"Yes," Marinette said as she pressed the back of her hands to her eyes. Dropping them, she looked to me a bit impishly and lowered her voice. "I haven't had to do alterations for you since that Kitty Section outfit I made years ago. You have quite the physique now, kitty."

I smiled. "Aw, you noticed."

"I had, yes," she said, smiling her private smile for Chat. "On more than a few occasions, actually."

As tired as I was, every feline fiber in me suddenly wanted to wrap her in a hug and spirit her away somewhere where she could review said physique more closely. Sadly, Adrien just continued to smile. "I'm… going to change and head home then, Marinette," I said somewhat loudly, playing to the small crowd. "Unless you need me?"

"No, I'm good for now. I'll see you tomorrow at the Grand Palais."

"Today, I think," I laughed.

"Don't remind me," she sighed.

Not long afterward, I was sitting on a chimney a few blocks from House of Gabriel, watching the moon slowly sink into the horizon. Transforming back to Chat had brought with it the requisite rush of adrenaline, and I knew going home to try and catch some shuteye wasn't really an option. So, instead I sat, tail swishing gently as I enjoyed the muted early morning sounds of the city I loved. When I'd been younger and still cooped up in the mansion as a teenager under Father's control, more nights than not had been spent roaming the city from dusk to dawn; on a few, I'd barely make it back to my bed before Nathalie would appear to awaken me for the day. Tired as I might have been the morning after, those evening prowls had been a much-needed outlet from the lockstep life Adrien had been expected to adhere to without question or complaint.

Now that I had a place of my own – and person I very much wanted to spend time with – I rarely spent nights out and about solo. It was therefore more than a little nostalgic sitting there, but not as much as I would have expected – for I was defelinely a happy kitty these days, unlike that teen from so long ago.

So much had changed for that lonely teenager. I sighed contentedly, thinking of all of the evenings I'd spent over the past year curled up on the couch with Marinette, holding her close and simply enjoying the delightful peace of being at one with the universe. Long had it been Chat toying with the ribbons in her hair; only recently had a certain supermodel replaced said feline, though in truth, Chat still appeared more nights than not. Especially when a round of purr therapy was required after a particularly long day for my girlfriend.

My ruminations were interrupted when my feline eyes caught an unusual movement on the rooftops below my perch. Night vision revealed a familiar but unexpected figure working his way along the spine of the apartment block — well, _lumbering_ might have been a better description. Smiling, I snagged my baton from it's resting place at the small of my back and leapt in his direction.

Landing a few meters to the side of Carapace, I leaned on my baton like a walking stick and grinned. "Turtles aren't normally nocturnal," I observed. "Does the Fox know you're out and about?"

Cap smiled a bit. I'd made enough (intentional) noise helicoptering toward him so as not to surprise him. "No," he replied with a slight trace of embarrassment. "I may have taken a page from a certain feline friend of mine and decided to get some fresh air."

A frown creased my masked visage. "I hope I'm not rubbing off on you," I said as I folded myself against a brick wall and idly twirled my baton. "Absent boyfriends are not the most welcome. And if I'm not mistaken, that fox of yours is rather of fond of you and prefers her turtle to be present."

Carapace looked away and then back. "You're not wrong," he laughed.

My green feline eyes search his begoggled ones, and I nodded slowly. "You were looking for me, weren't you?"

"Yeah," he replied. "You are a hard Chat to find, even _with_ the tracker," he laughed again, and my eyes fell on the small turtle phone that normally fit snugly into his shield. A very recognizable pawprint logo was illuminated on the small map. "This is actually the fourth night I've been out here. I should have asked Al—"

I cleared my throat.

"-Rena about your habits," he added, correcting his mistake in mid-sentence. "She used to chart what nights you were more likely than not to be roaming the night skies of the city."

My masked eyebrows went up. "She defelinely kept better tabs on me than I realized. Kindly tell her I don't caterwaul at the moon anymore. Not since Marinette became part of this kitty's life."

"I realize that now," he said as he snapped the phone shut and slid it back into his shield. "And I don't mean to intrude by any stretch."

"I know," I smiled as I put a paw to my best friend's shoulder. It was a little hard for me to reconcile the fact that while I knew who was under Carapace's mask, my own secret had yet to be shared with the guy who had been at my side since my first days at Dupont. "What's on your mind?"

Carapace sighed. "I want to marry Rena," he said, correctly staying in character this time.

I rolled my eyes. "No kidding. Haven't you been engaged for, what, two years now?"

"Four," he corrected quickly. "Originally, we wanted to finish with college, and then it was getting established in our careers."

"Sensible."

"Yeah," he said, fidgeting. "We've pushed the date of number of times now."

I watched his face, and could see he was deeply troubled. "Something's changed? Recently, I'll wager?"

Carapace looked at me, nodding. "I forget how you can do that," he smiled. "Yeah. What happened to us a few months ago has put some serious brakes on the whole thing, man. Both of us love each other, you know?" he said, his smile faltering. "And that thing Manon did, where she used it against us. Against _Rena_." He looked at me, his eyes full of pain.

"We're well beyond that, Cap," I said softly. "LB and I both know you were fighting it the whole time."

"This life we lead," he said, partially ignoring me while waving his green-gloved hands at the night sky. "We can't be a couple and do this, can we? Not when it means that loving her – and being loved by her – could put us into harm's way!"

"Sure we can," I answered. "I mean, I've loved Ladybug from the day I met her. _Love_ can't truly be used as a weapon."

"That's exactly what Manon proved to me," he said morosely. "That it _could_ be. And I never want to hurt Rena or see her hurt like that ever again."

I nodded slowly, recognition dawning. "You want to give up your Miraculous."

His eyes shot to mine. "I want _both_ of us to retire," he said softly. "I feel like I can't go through with marriage unless we do." Carapace walked to the edge of the roof. "Except… I know how much it means to Rena to be part of the team. Asking her to give it up is almost as bad as the prospect of getting her hurt _because_ she can be Rena."

"It's not exactly a zero-sum game, Carapace," I said after a moment. "One doesn't mean the exclusion of the other." I put my paw over his shoulder. "And giving up your Miraculous, while noble, is no guarantee that Rena will never get hurt – in love or in any other way."

Carapace looked at me. "That's easy for you to say," he replied sharply. "It's not _your_ girlfriend out there fighting the worst Hawkmoth can throw at us."

_It's not easy at all, my friend, _I thought. _Knowing I'm usually the only thing between girl I will love until my dying breath and her own demise makes me keenly aware of that._

He wasn't wrong, perhaps, for it had only been a short while that I'd known Marinette was Ladybug; at some level, though, it didn't truly change how I'd felt about protecting my partner. And how deeply I cared for her, despite her ostensibly loving someone else. Thankfully that someone else had been me all along. No, I knew very well how he felt; I chastised myself for not realizing sooner that he'd find himself in a similar position with respect to Rena.

_Some friend I am._

Despite wanting very badly to correct him, I instead choked by my impulse to reveal everything and smiled a warm Chat smile. "It really isn't," I replied. "I care immeasurably for all members of our team." I leaned in confidentially. "And don't tell Marinette, but some part of me still loves Ladybug. It would kill me if I ever let her get hurt. Or worse."

Carapace looked at me. "You don't think we should retire?"

"I think it's up to each of you what you do," I said. "But know this: Ladybug wouldn't have chosen either one of you if she hadn't felt you were up to the immense responsibility of being a holder. More than that, she's defelinely aware of how you feel about each other." I paused, smiling a bit. "I can't speak for LB, but I know her well enough to say that she likely feels your love for each other is an asset to the team. Not a liability."

He considered me for a moment. "Would you do this if you were married? With kids?"

That caught me for a moment. "Yes," I said after I thought about it. "Even if Marinette agreed to marry me, and we had kittens together – yes," I said with more certainty. "I will be Chat Noir until I'm not able to be effective any longer. And my hope is that is a long, long time from now."

"You wouldn't worry about putting your family in danger?" he asked.

"Of course I would," I replied. "But as Chat Noir, I'd-" I stopped, masked eyes widening. "Dude," I said softly. "Is that what this all about?"

I'd never seen Carapace – or Nino, for that matter – blush as deeply as he did in that moment. Even with night vision, it radiated like a small supernova. "Yeah," he said very, very quietly as he looked away in embarrassment.

"How far along is Rena?" I asked.

"Three months," he said.

I did the math on a paw and couldn't help the sly Chat smile. "You must have been quite… excited… to see Rena after we freed you from Manon's control."

His face darkened again. "We… uh, well… you have to understand. It had been weeks since we'd been able to be with each other – in the same apartment!" he hastened to add, realizing he was starting to sound like a rather bad romance novel.

"Clearly you made up for lost time," I chuckled.

"Yeah," Carapace replied, his face taking on a slight look of satisfaction. "Except we got rather carried away. It's my fault, really-" he looked back at me. "I can't do this with a kid," he finished quietly.

"Sure you can," I said. "Parents for millennia have had to balance kids and work."

Carapace arched an eyebrow. "I don't consider superhero duties work," he said.

"I dunno," I laughed. "I think any parent is a superhero at the end of the day. Fighting Hawkmoth is a piece of cake compared with what you're about to go through."

"Very funny," he chuckled, looking more relaxed than he had in a bit.

I held up my fist for a mutual bump. "Congrats, dude. I had no idea foxes could mate-"

"Hey!" he said, smacking my arm. "That's my future wife you're talking about."

"Sorry," I laughed deeper. "But like I said, it is up to you. If you want to relinquish your Miraculous, I'm sure Ladybug would understand. Especially if there are pups coming."

"Hey!" he cried out again. "They could be turtles!"

"I think I'll side with Rena on this one," I chuckled. "Come on, let me buy you a drink. There has to be a bar still open _somewhere_ in Paris that we can celebrate in."

"I highly doubt anyone will serve a cat and turtle," Carapace observed.

"At this hour?" I pointed out. "We will be far from the strangest customers."


	51. Showstorm

**Fifty-One: Showstorm**

_Author's Note: The day of the show has arrived, and Chat gets down to business helping Marinette. Except, of course, Hawkmoth has other ideas._

* * *

My head pounded mercilessly as I settled into the makeup chair; the combination of lack of sleep and the impromptu celebration with Carapace had caught up to me, and as I stared at the bedraggled image reflected back at me from the mirror, I knew my makeup artist had her work cut out for her. The paper cup in my hand was already my third coffee of the morning; early indicators had me worried there wasn't enough caffeine in the greater Paris metro area to get me through the show.

_Somehow_, I promised the image in the mirror, _I'll get through this day. It's for Milady anyway – which makes it totally worth the struggle._

I downed the last of the cup and started to get up to pour another from the pot in the corner when the door to my trailer opened and Madge appeared. "Hey cutie," she laughed as she breezed in with her bags.

I rolled my eyes. "I'm not sixteen anymore," I said as I hugged her, laughing as always at her joke.

"Doesn't mean you're not as handsome as you were back then," she smiled.

"I didn't know you were on today," I said as she guided me back into the chair and started to look me over. Madge had been with House of Gabriel since before I was even an Agreste; she was our top artist, and though I was also the top talent, even I didn't always have the honor of getting her. "What brings you out on a Tuesday?"

"When word came down that you were doing this," she said as she unpacked her goods, sliding the ones that House of Gabriel had already provided off to the side, "I asked for the gig. I haven't done your makeup for a fashion show in a few years now, so I wanted to knock the rust off as it were."

Arching an eyebrow, I looked at her. "I'm glad I could help," I said.

She looked at me in the mirror with a smile. "I like a challenge," she said, her eyes roaming me before she turned and put her hands to my face. "Which I clearly have on my hands. What on _earth_ have you done to yourself?"

"I've been putting in the hours getting ready for the show," I said defensively. "And… I may have helped a friend celebrate a milestone last night."

She turned my face one way and then the other, clucked, then ran a finger along my day-old stubble and clucked further. "Didn't used to have to deal with _that_," she muttered

That made me smile. "I _did_ remind you I'm not sixteen," I laughed.

"True," she murmured before hooking a finger in my shirt and looking down the front. "As does that," she groaned as she looked back at me. "Have you _completely_ forgotten you're a model?"

Despite my age, I felt a slight flush. "No," I said. "I just haven't done anything recently that didn't require a shirt," I replied, opting to leave out that I also spent a significant amount of time clad in magical black leather.

Madge rolled her eyes and turned to her bags, producing a razor and crème, then pointed me to the small bathroom at the rear of the trailer. "Go make this better while I get arranged."

I took the items from her and slid off the chair, feeling very much like I was once more a teenager but accepting the subtle rebuke in good humor. There were things one was supposed to do when one was a model, and to be perfectly frank, I'd been less and less inclined to keep up with the massive grooming regimen as I'd grown older. As I closed the door to the small space, disrobed and folded myself into the extremely tiny shower, I reminded myself that it was still an important part of my life – my career, for that matter – and resolved to be a little more diligent about it moving forward.

_Who am I kidding?_ I thought as I got down to business. _Time doing this kind of thing each day is time I _can't_ spend with Marinette. Too bad Chat Noir isn't part of this campaign. It would make this part easier…_

Sighing, I reminded myself yet again that the shelf life for a model – super or otherwise – tended to be quite short. I had maybe five more years before we'd have to find a new face for the Gabriel brand, a small window that I needed to make the most of.

Years of experience made short work of the process, and I managed to avoid nicking myself anyplace Madge couldn't easily hide with makeup. My latent feline sense of smell made the horrid scent of the shower gel more potent to me than normal, causing me to rinse a third time; it was one of the House brands that I detested and would never bring to the apartment. Father had a weird sense of what people liked in the fragrance department, stretching back to that awful perfume with my name on it. It was one of many things I'd been trying to change.

The hot water revived some part of me, and I felt more like Adrien Agreste when I re-appeared for Madge in comfy sweats. "Much better," she said as she attacked me with her waiting brush.

Thirty minutes after that, I was bronzed in tanning pigments from head to toe, my hair had been gelled within an inch of its life, and all traces of my sleepless nights had been hidden beneath enough makeup I nearly looked like I was sixteen again. Shrugging into the first outfit, I arrived backstage at the massive runway that had been crafted off to the side of the Grand Palais a fraction of a moment before the sun finally cleared the top of the glass dome. Peeking around, I could see the angle of the runway itself was perfectly set to be full of natural illumination, something that would make the outfits I was about to showcase seem all the more alluring. It was an old trick from my Father that I was not ashamed to reuse.

Marinette was there waiting for me, holding a clipboard and wearing a headset. She looked as exhausted as I felt, but a smile brightened her face as I strode over to her. "Hey kit—Adrien," she greeted, quickly covering her gaffe.

I raised my eyebrows, for it was unusual for Marinette to break character. "You deserve a long vacation after this is all over," I said as I did the traditional air kisses. I had to tamp back my inner Chat desire to planta real one on those soft lips of hers.

"Or at least a long weekend," she agreed. "You cut it kind of close," she chastised. "We're on in five. And where _were_ you last night? I thought I'd find you at home-"

I started, for in the pre-reveal days, I had kept Marinette pretty much in the loop on any late-night carousing I might do as Chat. Rather guiltily I realized I'd never texted her I was out with Carapace. And as I started to explain myself, I also realized I had yet another secret that, technically, was not mine to share.

_Oh, Hell,_ I thought. _Screw the secrets_.

"I ran into Carapace," I said softly as I pulled her away from the stage entrance and over to a small copse of trees. "He had news and afterward we went to celebrate."

Marinette looked at me, and her smile widened. "Hot damn!" she laughed.

"Wait..." I said, confused. "You knew?"

"More like suspected. Alya texted me a few days ago about the merits of peanut butter-and-pickle sandwiches-"

"Eeew," I replied, grimacing.

"-exactly! And we managed to sneak in lunch together yesterday-"

"So _that's _where you wandered off to," I accused, arching my eyebrow higher. I'd snuck into her workspace at Chateau Le Blanc as Chat to surprise her with lunch only to discover she'd gone out. Fortunately, her fellow designers – all well aware of who Marinette's boyfriend was – enjoyed the chicken pot pie I'd picked up from the Bakery.

"–nothing fancy, just onion soup and a baguette at the café in the lobby."

I rolled my eyes. I'd been several stories above her and missed her completely.

Marinette smiled a bit more. "She when green at, of all things, the smell of the coffee being roasting and made a mad dash to the washroom."

My eyes widened. "I take it lunch was short."

Marinette nodded. "But not before Alya managed to snarf down three ham-and-cheese croissants in addition to two bowls of soup."

I nodded. "That's not like her at all."

My girlfriend laughed. "It wasn't hard to start to wonder if she was eating for two." She looked at me after first glancing at the stage. "Cap told you? Directly?" She lowered her voice. "As _Chat_?"

"Yeah," I said, glancing up myself. "This might not be the best time to discuss it," I whispered.

Marinette started to reply; at that moment, the thick plywood and plastic-covered background for the runway burst into a million pieces of shrapnel; instinctively, I hurled myself at Marinette, only half hearing the tearing of the fabric of the shirt she'd spent all night creating. Covering her as best as I could, I turned my back to the falling debris, ignoring what felt like a million tiny needles as they impacted my back.

Breathing hard and blinking to clear the dust from my eyes, I hurried the two of us away from the stage and the screams, eyes darting for any kind of cover the two of us could use to transform. "Left or right?" I yelled over the increasing din of destruction behind us.

"Right!" Marinette cried as she pushed away from me and made a mad dash to a small gazebo that was still standing.

I waited long enough to see the pink flash had gone unobserved by anyone else before running left and to the loading dock for the Grand Palais; bolting down the ramp, I transformed at the bottom and leapt upward and back into the fight, scrabbling my way across the stonework of the building. Up, up and higher up I tossed myself in an attempt to gain some altitude and, hopefully, some perspective on what we were facing.

Running along the edge of the glass rooftop, I crouched at the edge and looked down at what was left of our big day. Piles of rubble were everywhere, but thankfully there was no evidence of anyone injured. The screams had faded away as those working the shoot had scattered from the scene. Perhaps the only good thing to come from Hawkmoth's incessant attacks was a pretty standard get-away-as-fast-as-you-can mentality from our fellow Parisians.

My feline ears caught a whisper on the wind and I turned just in time to see the graceful form of my bespotted partner as she landed softly next to me. "I haven't seen so much as a whisker of an akuma," I replied to the unspoken question. "I was about to go do a more detailed inspection. Would you care to join me, Milady?"

Her unexpected pause caught me.

"...Milady?" I prompted, hands immediately going to her arms. "What's wrong?"

She wordlessly pointed across the plaza, and I followed her finger to see a particular blue-and-feather themed costumed figure proudly standing on the gargoyle of a building across the street from the Grand Palais. Mauyra had to have caught sight of us, for she playfully waved her fan in our general direction before leaping up and over the apex of the roof, scurrying down the other side as fast as she could go (even in those insanely high heels of hers).

"Lovely," I groaned. "That can only mean-"

The massive crash from what was left of the stage had me snap my wild mane back in that direction. This time it took mere seconds for my masked feline eyes to pick out the several-story-tall sentimonster; it looked a bit like a top heavy wedding cake, or at the very least as though someone had haphazardly stacked bolts of fabric one upon the other with no rhyme or reason. A thimble-esque hat sat upon the uppermost layer, and it had definitely begun to move toward our spot on the Grand Palais.

"Is it a two-fer or a three-fer," I asked as we backed up a bit.

"I don't follow," Ladybug replied as she snagged an overhang to pull herself up to the next tier of the cupola.

I followed her on the baton. "The two-fer would be an akuma inside that sentimonster. A three-fer is Mayura trying to tempt us to split up."

My partner nodded. "That had crossed my mind," she said. "But we both know she's too much to handle alone." She narrowed her eyes at the incoming sentimonster. "God, I hate these things. Finding the akumatized object is child's play compared to the amuck."

"I completely agree," I said, turning toward her again. "So, let's take out this-"

"Chat! _Look out!"_ Ladybug cried.

Running purely on instinct, I vaulted up and into the sky, twisting around to face the sentimonster as I rose. A bolt of what looked like an ugly plaid from another century sailed through where I'd just been standing and smashed one of the elegant panes of glass in the cupola, raining shards down into the space below. I heard Ladybug zipline away to the right as I came down into a pounce-crouch with my ring hand extended, palm first, at the critter.

I don't know _how_ I knew I could do it, but I found myself watching in detached amazement as a tiny ball of Cataclysm destruction formed and shot away from me, nailing the sentimonster on the thimble. I didn't have time to digest it turning to dust before I'd managed to get off three more of those beauties, taking out several sections of the creature before it hurled another part of itself at me.

A carefully aimed shot and the resulting dust blew away ten meters in front of me.

By that point, I'd leapt to a new position, following Ladybug's path. Sliding down my baton to street level, I landed next to a stunned but smiling Ladybug. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" she asked as she spun up her yo-yo.

I flipped around to face the sentimonster and hurled a half-dozen more Cataclysms at it; in seconds, I had reduced it to a pile of ash, up from which the small amuck feather started to fly away. Ladybug nabbed it with her yo-yo as I stood up next to her.

"That it's a two-fer?" I replied as we began to sprint after Mayura.

"No," she laughed. "Whether to be excited you have that new ability or terrified to the core."

"Terrified," I replied honestly. "Completely, totally, terrified."

Ladybug chuckled. "Let's see if we can make Mayura feel the same."


	52. Feline Intervention

**Fifty-Two: Feline Intervention**

_Author's Note: Guilty at how hard Marinette worked on the fashion show – and concerned at how much her first year at Chateau Le Blanc has taken out of her, Chat decides to try and de-stress her as only a feline can._

* * *

Mayura had gotten too much of a head start for us to catch her; circling the city once, we found no trace of Hawkmoth's henchwoman, despite my fear that she would drop another sentimonster in our path. On our way back to the fashion show, I openly wondered to Ladybug whether she had seen the upgrade to my secret powers and had decided to hightail her feathers back to the boss.

"It's possible," Ladybug had agreed as she called for her Lucky Charm (it was, unironically, a pair of fabric shears) and then the Miraculous Cure to put the stage right once more. "But that also means Hawkmoth will factor that into his next attack. We'll need to be ready."

Sadly, her spell didn't extend to my ruined outfit, but other than that one casualty, no one had been hurt in the attack. Somewhat troubling, we were unable to locate _who_ had spawned the sentimonster, and for the rest of the day, I kept my eyes peeled for anything extraordinary.

In between clothing changes, I caught Alya backstage, camera in one hand, notebook in the other and her press credentials around her neck. "Adrien!" she called out as I tried to hurry toward the rack of clothing. "Got a moment?"

I waved her over. "As long as you have no qualms with me changing in front of you," I said as I trained a Chat smile on her.

"I'll avert my gaze at the proper time," she laughed as I plucked the next outfit from the rack and began to shuck out of my current one. "Tell me a bit about this line..." she started.

Over the course of the next four outfits, I filled her in on the partnership with Chateau Le Blanc and how impressed I was with the designs Marinette had come up with. "I knew she had what it took back at Dupont," I told the journalist as I donned a v-neck polo that caught her gaze. I tried not to smirk as her eyes followed the neckline right to my six-pack of abs that were highlighted by the form-hugging sport fabric Marinette had chosen. Clearing my throat caused her to snap her attention back to me, and I chuckled.

"Sorry," she said, slightly flustered.

"I've been known to have that effect on women," I replied. "But shame on you! Aren't you engaged?" I joshed.

Her face flamed a bit deeper.

"Your secret is safe with me," I said softly as I pulled my friend to me and hugged her. "Did you get everything you needed?" I asked as I headed back to the stage.

"Yes," she said. "I've got some shots from your first few runway walks and will get a few more."

"Cool," I smiled. "If you need any other angles, let my office know and we'll send them over."

"I'll do that," she nodded. "I won't be able to use everything in the print version but we can add a gallery to the online article."

"I love modern journalism," I laughed before pausing at the stage entrance. "I don't know why you happened to be here today," I added, "but I'm glad you are. It's important to me that Marinette breaks through."

Something crossed Alya's face before she smiled. "I was... outfoxed by a cat," she said rather deliberately.

I felt the color drain from my face; fortunately, I was wearing enough makeup to hide it. Keeping my model smile up, I replied with a hint of curiosity: "Indeed? That sounds like a story and then some."

"You have no idea," she laughed. "I'll _cat_ch you later," she continued, subtly emphasizing what only I would see as a pun as she closed her notebook and headed around to the front of the stage.

I stood there, frozen, one hand on the curtain, knowing I had somehow overplayed my hand with Alya.

_Shit._

* * *

"I might have blown it," I said to Ladybug many, many hours later.

"Oh?" she asked dreamily.

She was leaning across me sideways, her head cradled against my lap, and I was carefully rubbing the soft pads of my paws on either temple. The accumulated tension of the past few weeks was slowly easing in her body, but she was still far too tense for my tastes – despite the fashion show in the end being a smashing success (pun intended). "What did you do this time, kitty?"

I had my back up against a crossbeam of the Eiffel Tower, lounging in our favorite late-night hangout with the best views of the city lights. "Well," I started, "I don't know if you noticed Alya at our little soiree today-"

"I did, actually." She snuggled closer into me, and for a moment I laughed a bit at the flip in our positions. Normally I was the one languidly relaxing upon her lap. "It's almost like she can sniff when Hawkmoth is going to appear."

"True," I said, dithering a bit. I wasn't very good with confessions.

"She had quite the article in the online version of the paper," Ladybug said with tired excitement, ignoring the trace of hesitation in my voice. "I can't wait to see what is in print tomorrow."

"It should be good," I said, having actually already read it and knowing it would send our sales through the roof.

Something in my tone finally caused Ladybug turn her head up. "What did you do?"

"Uh..." I swallowed. "I, uh, might have gone to her as Chat to ask her to be there?"

"That was thoughtful," she murmured as she swiveled back into position. "And so Chat."

"Yeah."

The silence stretched for a long moment.

"I think she knows who Chat Noir is."

Ladybug sat up. "Shit," she said.

"Yeah," I hung my head, bangs falling forward. "That was my thought exactly."

Sliding out of my embrace, Ladybug settled next to me on the wide beam, eyes searching my face. "How?" she asked simply.

"I don't know exactly," I sighed. "I'm sure it wasn't any one thing, just a bunch of tiny things that must have suddenly popped together as a complete picture for her." I reached over to play with the ribbon on her ponytail – it was a new style she was experimenting with as Ladybug, and I had to admit I really liked it – and continued. "Our friend is a smart fox, anyway."

"Oh kitty," she said as she leaned her head into me. "This could be bad."

A thought struck me as we sat there. "Maybe not," I said thoughtfully. "It was more of a wink-wink moment, to be honest. A hint that she knew? But that was as far as it would go?"

Ladybug sat up again, nodding as she looked at me. "Alya is well aware how important you are to me – well, both versions of me, now that I think about it – as well as to the city," she said slowly. "I don't think she would willingly put that in jeopardy."

"I agree," I said, eyes widening slightly at the thread Ladybug started. Swearing, I continued. "If she's made one connection…?"

"_Shit_," Ladybug said with emphasis as she squeezed her eyes shut and smacked her forehead into my costumed chest. "Well, there's nothing for it. We need to come up with a way to find out if they know without us knowing that we know they know."

I groaned. "That sounds confusing. And something from a movie I love."

"Yes," she moaned as she slowly hit her head against my chest repeatedly. "I think I need a vacation."

I leaned down and breathed into her ear. "Got you covered," I whispered.

She looked up at me. "We can't leave Paris right now," she said. "Especially if Alya has ferreted out your identity. We need to deal with that and any fallout."

"Sure we can," I smiled wider. "We happen to know two heroes who might be available. In fact, it could be a blessing. Rena still needs to impart her news to Ladybug; having her cover the weekend for us will let you reaffirm your faith in her and solidify her resolve to keep our secrets."

"Sounds like emotional blackmail, kitty," Ladybug said skeptically. "That's not my trade-in-stock."

"No, bugaboo, it's not. But I happen to be well versed in it," I replied as I kissed the top of her head. The soft fragrance that was my partner made it hard to focus on what I was saying. "Honestly, if what Carapace told me stands up – and I have no reason to doubt my friend – Alya will protect me—protect _us_—for as long as is necessary."

"Chat—"

"I've already reserved the cottage," I said. "We leave Thursday night after work."

Ladybug started to protest again. "There's no way—"

I put a claw tip to her lips. "Are you honestly going to tell me that after the month we've had – hell, the last ten days we've been through – a little time on the beach would be unwelcome?" I leaned a little closer, and nibbled at the edge of her nose. "Forty-eight hours of my undivided feline attention catering to your every whim?"

Ladybug's eyes narrowed and got a familiar evil gleam to them. "_Every_ whim?" she asked carefully.

Warning bells went off in my feline brain, but I nodded eagerly, nonetheless. "Absolutely, Milady. You are worth it."

She nodded, the evil gleam seamlessly transitioning into her gleeful expression. "All right. Let's pay a quick visit to our friends and see if they are up to babysitting Paris for a few days."

"Funny you should put it quite that way..." I laughed as she pulled out her Bug Phone.

* * *

We met Carapace and Rena on the wall overlooking the Trocadero Plaza later that evening. If they thought it was unusual for Ladybug to call them out late on a random Tuesday night without an akuma alert, they gave no indication at all.

I wasn't surprised they were there ahead of us, actually; Alya had been wearing an unusually loose outfit when I'd seen her at the show earlier, and wondered how she would try to mask her pregnancy from us. It had been a bit since Ladybug had called them to duty, and given that my partner was, technically, unaware of Rena's change in parenthood status, I understood why she was using Carapace's form to partially shield the torso of her rather form-fitting fox outfit.

Catching Cap's eye as I landed in a crouch beside him, he frowned slightly. I shot him a questioning look, but there was no time to follow-up before Ladybug bookended us by landing beside Rena. "Hey guys," I said warmly. "Thanks for meeting us."

"Anytime," Rena said brightly. "What's up?"

"We want to take a long weekend," Ladybug said. "Do you feel up to covering for us?" she asked as she glanced meaningfully at Rena, pointedly avoiding looking at what I could easily see from my angle was a definite baby bump.

"Yes," Rena said quickly.

"No," Cap said almost as immediately.

I felt my mane bobbing as I looked from face to face. "Okay," I smiled slightly. "What do we do in cases of ties?"

"I trump my partner," Rena said as nudged him in the ribs. "We'll do it."

"Rena, honey, I'm not sure—"

"It will be _fine_," the fox replied hotly, reflecting her coloring for once. "We're not talking weeks here, shell."

My ears shot up. Rena only called him _shell_ when they had been arguing. "Guys…" I started, eyes darting to Carapace. "Is… is everything all right?" I asked despite Carapace's frantic expression.

"Yes," Rena said, smacking Cap.

"Totally," Carapace said, though his eyes spoke to something else.

I looked to Ladybug, who had picked up the same vibe. Clearly Carapace's discussion with Rena about balancing family and superhero work hadn't gone as well as I'd hoped. Rena caught my glance again and flushed deeper as she twisted away from my slightly; it wasn't hard for me to have second thoughts about putting her and her child at risk for the sake of my weekend.

"Rena," I said softly, as I looked to Cap. He looked away, putting his hand to his head. I turned back to the fox. "This is one secret you _can't_ keep."

I caught Ladybug nodding. "How far along are you?" Ladybug asked. There was no reproach in her voice, no judgement; just warmth at the joy Rena was experiencing.

Rena smiled slightly, and moved out of Carapace's shadow. "Three months," she said as she cradled her tummy. Now fully exposed, I could see it was actually larger than I expected.

"He's going to be one big kitten," I said appreciatively.

"Who says it's going to be a boy?" Rena laughed.

"Do you know?" Ladybug asked.

"Not yet," Rena smiled wistfully. "I've been going back and forth. _He-"_ she nodded to Cap, "desperately wants to know. It's sort of fun keeping him guessing."

"No," Carapace replied. "It isn't."

"Look," Ladybug said as she slid over to her best friend, placing a gloved hand on her shoulder. "I would totally understand if you wanted to step back for a bit. Take some time." She paused. "Be a mom."

Rena sighed. "Cap and I had this very talk already," she said, looking to her fiancé and reaching for his hand. "I'd like to still be part of the team, Ladybug. But why do I feel guilty for wanting to do both?"

Ladybug smiled slightly. "It's what women have had to deal with for hundreds of years. A career or motherhood. There never seems to be a middle road for us."

For a moment, I felt a flame of anger, for Rena was right. And if I could stop it-

"So do both," I interjected.

All three of them turned to look at me.

"Take some time off when the kitten is born," I offered. "Then we'll ease you back into the rotation. We'll make it work, even if we have to press every temporary holder into babysitting service." I smiled. "Just wait until Uncle Chat teaches it how intriguing a ball of yarn can be."

Rena chuckled. "That might be harder if it's a fox."

"Or a turtle," Carapace added.

"Kitten," I said firmly.

Ladybug chuckled. "I can't believe you aced Biology, Chat. Your lack of understanding around genetics is a bit shocking."

"It's a feline," I shrugged with a smile, though I caught a nod from Rena at that.

_Oops. Ladybug is gonna need to be more careful..._

"You might be projecting a bit," Rena said, looking at Ladybug pointedly.

I coughed and changed directions. "Do you feel up to covering for us?" I asked. "We'd completely understand-"

"I do," Rena replied. "To be honest, I'm not sure how much longer I can – or should – transform. This might be my last chance for a bit."

"Are you _certain_?" Ladybug pressed.

"Yes," Rena said firmly. "I've got Carapace to look after me-"

"Which I plan to do forever, love," he reminded her with a squeeze to her gloved hand.

"-so we should be just fine."

"Okay," I smiled. "While we'll be out of Paris we won't be out of contact. If you need us—"

"Chat will have his baton on him at all times," Ladybug interjected. "So you can call us."

My masked green eyes snapped to hers. "That's not a whim I was expecting," I said. "You are likely to have a rather hot and bothered kitty on your hands-"

"I know," she smirked. "You agreed, however."

"I guess," I said, masked eyes widening in wonder at what exactly Ladybug had planned now.

"Uh…" Carapace said, clearing his throat.

"Sorry," Ladybug said before locking eyes on Rena. "Are you both _sure_ you can cover? For us?" she asked one last time. "It could take us hours to return if you get into trouble."

"We'll be fine," Rena said, turning to Carapace. "Won't we?"

Carapace looked at me, and we both shared a moment as we realized we would do pretty much whatever our girlfriends asked. "Yes," he nodded, saying more than just agreeing with Rena.

"Okay," I smiled. "Hopefully we'll see you in a few days – and not before."

* * *

We did a repeat of the train maneuver from our first trip to Nice, enjoying a private berth on the nonstop bullet train Thursday evening. The only change happened once we arrived in Nice; just outside the station, Marinette transformed and the two of us moved through the gathering darkness toward the isolated cottage on the outskirts of town. I couldn't deny the extra burst of excitement seeing _Ladybug_ just ahead of me, and the anticipation of spending the whole weekend with her as just myself.

It wasn't that the first visit had been anything but exceptional; so much had changed since then, though, and I was defelinely happy I'd not have to be careful to keep from exposing my alter-ego. As we landed atop the decorative fence separating the cottage from the lane, I found myself smiling. She needed the time off, for sure, but I was starting to realize I did, too. I sent up a tiny prayer that Hawkmoth would be otherwise occupied for the next few days.

I landed at the foot of the front door in a crouch, and Ladybug glided down her yo-yo beside me. As soon as her feet hit the paving stone, she quietly said: "Tikki, spots off."

The pink flash of transformation surrounded her, and Marinette reappeared in the cute casual outfit she'd designed. "You look amazing," I said as I stood and put my paws around her shoulders. "Plagg—"

"Uh, no," she smiled, putting a finger to my lips. "This is _my_ weekend, right?"

I nodded, masked eyes widening. "I thought you were kidding," I said around her finger.

"No," she smiled wider. "I wasn't."

"I didn't tell Plagg about that," I cautioned. "He won't be very happy with me. It's been months since I spent back-to-back days transformed."

"I warned him last night," Tikki replied sweetly. "I may have even bribed him."

"You… you _bribed_ him…?" Feline eyes looked between the two of them, and I felt my jaw drop open with dawning recognition. "This… this is not exactly how I thought this weekend was going to go…" I said.

"Everyone needs a surprise from time to time," Marinette said as she pulled me down to kiss her. "Even you, kitty."

I let my tail snake around her. "As you wish, Milady," I smiled as I scooped her up in my paws and pushed through the door.

"Chat!" she squeaked as I left our luggage on the portico and bounded up the steps to the loft with my precious cargo. "What are you doing?"

"Getting the weekend underway," I purred, nuzzling her as I pushed into the master bedroom. The king bed was made and waiting, and in two leaps I was there. "Surprise…" I said softly as I gently deposited her and started to move away.

"Oh kitty," she smiled as she reached for my bell, gently pulling me back toward her. "Not so fast, you. Come hither."

I happily complied.


	53. Purrsonal Attention

**Fifty-Three: Purrsonal Attention**

_Author's Note: Chat makes sure Marinette enjoys a much-needed break from the demands of both her career and the weight of her responsibilities as Ladybug._

* * *

Once more I awoke to bands of sunshine streaming through the windows of the master bedroom facing the beach; this time out, though, the ecstasy of being caught in the warmth of the rays was multiplied geometrically by my costume's ability to soak up every last trace of heat, and I heard my purring ramp up a few notches. My back was to the windows, for I had engulfed my girlfriend, spooning around her as if I were liquid to cover as much of her form as I could. I wasn't entirely sure where the sheet had gone off too, so I pressed myself a bit closer, resting my chin on her bare shoulder and taking a deep lungful of her unique scent.

I hadn't lied – before revealing myself to Marinette, I'd significantly ramped down my time transformed, making liberal use of the mask and outfits she'd created so I could give Plagg some freedom. After the reveal, Chat would be the one to return from work, but Adrien had become omnipresent in the apartment. Save for those evenings when I knew she needed what only Chat could provide, it had been months since I'd spent more than ten hours transformed, let alone slept as a feline.

What I'd not forgotten, though, was how exquisite the experience living as a human feline could be. With all of my senses enhanced, I felt more connected to the universe than my alter-ego could possibly enjoy. And, as with the strange new way Cataclysm was working, I was beginning to note other subtle changes, too. Looking down at my paw, I smiled as I watched my claws retract and then re-appear. I smiled wider when I realized how they had played a starring role in the prior evening's endeavors to get Marinette to relax.

As the memory of her shuddering beneath my touch replayed in my happily groggy state - I had gone above and beyond the call of duty, no question – it occurred to me she might never allow anyone other than Chat into her bed again. I felt bad for my alter-ego... but only a little.

Marinette stirred and then sighed softly before adjusting a bit, sleepily pulling my arm around her a bit closer. "I could wake up like this every morning," she whispered.

"I'll make a note of that, Princess," I breathed into her ear. "Any thoughts on breakfast?"

Impressively, Marinette swiftly flipped around to face me, startling me slightly at her speed. "Yes," she said as she grabbed me by the bell and slowly pulled me toward her lips. "I do."

* * *

By the time Marinette stepped into the shower to get ready for what remained of the day, breakfast had become brunch. Loping down the steps to the main level, I paused in the sunken living room to appreciate the view for a moment; the wide, white sandy beach surrounding our personal boardwalk tugged at me, but my rumbling tummy was a priority now, so I reluctantly leapt to the kitchen and started perusing for ingredients.

The kitchen had been restocked in anticipation of our arrival, including a selection of wine I knew Marinette truly enjoyed. I tapped a claw against the bottles and smiled, knowing how upset she would be when she saw the labels and deduced just how much I'd spent on our little getaway. Turning one, I smiled wider, knowing it had required a late-night visit to the wine cellar at the mansion. Dinner with Father had been the price for that beauty, but much like the other bottles, Marinette was more than worth it.

A plan forming, I pulled the bottle from the rack and uncorked it with a claw, reaching for the elegant glass decanter on the shelf. I wasn't a sommelier by any stretch, but knew enough that a fine bottle of red needed to be treated with respect. As I poured the ruby liquid from the bottle, my feline sense of smell easily picked up the multifaceted components of the wine, causing a smile to appear on my masked face. Being Chat always allowed me to enjoy the wine twice.

Setting the decanter aside to allow the wine to breathe, I snagged the fresh ground hamburger from the fridge and set it to brown in one pan; as it started to sizzle, I began to chop an onion into another, drizzled with olive oil, and slowly started to sweat them down a bit. Happily humming to myself, I worked through the rest of my mental recipe for pasta sauce, one based on the house version Phillipe used at his Bistro – and one that a certain feline had been forced to beg for. It wasn't quite the same as the one he used in his lasagna – my version of that was on deck for Saturday, actually – but it ran a close second for Marinette when it came to Italian dishes she truly enjoyed.

The water was just beginning to boil for the noodles and my breadsticks had gotten their second coating of garlic butter when Marinette finally appeared on the steps. My feline ears caught her first step on the tread and I looked up to see my movie-star-gorgeous girlfriend descend as if she were truly the royalty I treated her as. Being a cat, wolf-whistles weren't in my repertoire - but a low sensual growl was.

And how could I not? Dressed for the beach, she was wearing a petite two-piece swimsuit of her own design that exposed more than it hid; a small shift had been tied at her hip, giving the entire affair an even more exotic flair. Her hair was up in a casual bun, strands framing her smile and those gorgeous eyes as they connected with mine. The slight smirk may have been in response to her effect on me, which, honestly, was the point of the exercise in the first place.

I had to clear the lump in my throat twice before I was able to speak. "Milady, you look stunning," I said, trying for sultry and instead hearing my voice crack like I was a teenager with raging hormones.

"Thank you, kitty," she smiled as she settled in on the barstool across from me, then leaned down on her elbows. My eyes were drawn exactly where she wanted them to be drawn, and she laughed slightly as she reached over to push my masked face toward the bubbling pot of noodles.

I growled lowly again, and realized belatedly there were other, more powerful feline impulses that a cat in his prime needed to contend with. For the first time I started to wonder if I was playing with fire. I struggled to turn away from the amazingly, insanely alluring scent of my girlfriend and tried to focus on the meal I was preparing.

I stared at the cooktop for a full ten seconds, trying to remember what I was making.

"Chat?" Marinette asked, concern in her voice. "Are you okay?"

Turning my masked face back to her, I hid my swirling emotions behind a classic Chat smile. "Defelinely now that you're here. Pour yourself some wine, I'm just about ready."

_More than ready,_ I groaned inwardly as my costume suddenly felt uncomfortably tight in certain areas. I silently thanked the architect for the strategic placement of the counter.

"All right," she smiled, oblivious – or not – to my predicament.

"If..." I put my paws on the countertop, shaking my mane to regain some self-control.

"If?" Marinette asked. "If what?"

_What the Hell is wrong with me?_ I thought frantically as I took a deep, shaking breath.

"Chat?" Marinette asked. "You checked out there for a moment."

"Sorry," I said, smiling sheepishly.

"What's wrong?" she asked, genuinely concerned.

_I'm struggling with my self-control_ didn't seem like an appropriate response, so I smiled wider. "I was trying to remember if I had ordered fruit for the pie I want to make tomorrow. You like apple, right?"

"Yes," she nodded, though I could easily tell she'd seen through my tissue-thin lie. Arching an eyebrow, she let it pass.

"Anyway," I said as I strained the noodles. "I was thinking of eating on the patio – do you mind setting out place settings for two...?"

* * *

The breeze from the ocean was more gentle than normal as we curled together on the comfortable wicker couch enjoying a final glass of wine from our meal. Our part of the beach was secluded and quiet, and with the shore being more than a hundred meters from the cottage, the crash of the surf was somewhat muted into a wonderful background noise.

I was laying on my side but across her lap, watching the waves as they crashed along the white sandy beach. Marinette was idly stroking my wild mane with the hand not holding her wine, occasionally running a fingertip along the edge of a feline ear just to see me squirm enough to spill my own glass. My gentle purring added to the gloriously languid feeling of the afternoon; with a full belly, excellent wine and the exotic fragrance of my girlfriend filling my feline nose, I was close to dropping into a wonderful catnap.

"This was an excellent idea," Marinette sighed. "Good thinking."

"I try," I smiled as I snuggled into her.

Marinette leaned down and kissed me between my feline ears. "That you do," she whispered softly as I drifted off to sleep.

The warmth of Marinette's lips against mine pulled me awake somewhat later; smiling as I opened my masked eyes, I carefully reciprocated before pulling away. "Now, that is a meowverlous way to wake a feline," I purred as looked up at those delightfully sparkling blue eyes.

"Welcome back," she smiled.

Seeing how the afternoon had essentially run it's course, I frowned. "I hadn't intended to sleep the day away," I said sadly, seeing her small bag of beach essentials prepped and ready to go by the stone steps leading to the boardwalk.

"I did," Marinette smiled wider.

I looked at her askance. "Are we talking about the same thing?" I asked with a slight smile.

Marinette leaned down and kissed me again, then pulled back just enough to reach for my bell. Slowly, she started to unzip it.

"That's what I thought..." I laughed.

* * *

Despite not getting to the beach proper, on the whole our first day in Nice had been extraordinary in every other way. I'd planned a cold dinner of chef salads originally, but given how the day had gone, spontaneously shuffled my plans. I'd managed to sweet talk Sabine into sharing her family recipe for coq au vin, a dish I knew Marinette favored. Given how much energy the two of us had expended, a heavier, protein-rich menu seemed prudent – especially since the evening portended more of the same.

As I moved through the kitchen getting the casserole ready for the oven, Marinette was lounging on the couch in the sunken living room; a fashion magazine with yours truly on the cover was against her chest, forgotten as she softly snored. I paused for a moment, fixing her beautiful image into my feline brain, knowing that it was the first time in months that she'd been able to truly relax.

Setting the oven, I re-checked the potatoes and the fresh green beans, then made sure my chocolate pudding was setting up properly in the fridge. Another glance at my girlfriend and I realized it was my chance to sneak away for a moment.

Using all of my black cat stealth, I dropped to all fours and slunk up the steps to the master bedroom as quietly as I could. Pausing at the landing, I verified she was still sleeping before vaulting into the room and moving directly to the nightstand on my side of the bed. Sliding the drawer open revealed the small black velour-covered box with a familiar Day-Glo green paw-print on the top I'd snuck into it when we'd first arrived.

Unzipping a costume pocket, I paused; zipping it back up, I pulled my baton from the small of my back and snapped open the hidden compartment. Before I lost my nerve, I dropped the box in and snapped it shut, vaulting back out of the room to slink down the steps to the living room. Instead of returning to the kitchen, though, I skulked into the sunken living room and folded myself into my patented patient-cat stance, cocking my head slightly as I watched Marinette in repose.

"I love you," I said softly and with meaning. "More than you can ever know. And I will continue to love you every single day of our life we are able to spend together. Which," I sighed, thinking of the ring hidden at the small of my back, "I furrvently hope we get to do."

Marinette stirred, stretching a bit as her eyes fluttered open. Catching sight of me, she smiled questioningly. "Did I miss something?" she asked.

"Nope," I replied as I leaned up to nuzzle her happily. "Nothing at all..."


	54. Out In The Open

**Fifty-Four: Out In The Open**

_Author's Note: As their weekend in Nice continues, Chat's plan to propose to Marinette gets sidetracked when he checks in with the backup team holding down the fort in Paris._

* * *

_Special note: My apologies at the shorter posting – I've been working on my Camp NaNoWriMo July novel (eagle-eyed readers may have seen me posting bits in Tumblr), and time got away from me this week. We'll have a longer update next week to make up for it. Chat is insisting on it. –ep_

* * *

Dinner had gone better than expected on Friday – so much so, though, that further conversation after dessert had not been possible. The box remained hidden in my baton when I awoke the following morning, curled around Marinette in front of the stone fireplace that was in the corner of the living room. The fire I'd built had long ago burned out, though Marinette appeared not to have noticed.

Snuggling down against her, I started to think through my plans for Saturday. Shifting my dinner the night prior was _supposed_ to have been my opportunity to propose; now I needed to decide which meal on Saturday was the better option. Lasagna was still on the menu for dinner, and as I thought about it a bit more, decided it would be the purrfect backdrop.

Carefully sliding away from my girlfriend, I wrapped the comforter I'd brought down earlier around her and moved to the double doors leading out onto the patio; carefully, I slid them open and then closed them behind me, pulling out my baton as I went. The time on my Cat Phone said Carapace was likely to be up, so I speed dialed him just to check in.

Cap's smiling face appeared on my screen. "Hey Chat, you're up early."

"Maybe I never went to bed," I said as I waggled my masked eyebrows.

"Geez, Chat," he laughed as he rolled his eyes. "I had no idea you'd take the feline act _that_ far."

I shrugged. "Who says it's an act? Especially since I know how much Marinette loves her some feline ears."

Something wafted across Carapace's face, which gave me pause.

"What?" I asked, narrowing my eyes.

"Nothing," he said quickly.

"Cap, it was _something_. Is everything ok? Do I need reach out to Ladybug and get back there?"

"No... no, everything is fine here. Hawkmoth hasn't so much as akumatized a pigeon so far."

"That's a relief," I smiled, and yet I could tell something was still off with Carapace. I watched him closely for a moment, replaying our conversation in my brain. Had I said something?

Had I _not_ said something?

"Are you returning to Paris tomorrow, still?" Cap asked.

"Yes," I nodded slowly, still wondering.

"And Ladybug will be, too?" he asked.

"As far as I know," I replied, keeping to the agreed upon cover story. "I've not talked with her since leaving the city."

This time I _did_ see something, and it lingered for a moment before Carapace recomposed his face. I could have sworn it was a smirk of some kind, which was amazingly out of character from him. "That would seem... difficult... for you," he said carefully.

I frowned as I started to reply and then caught myself, for Carapace was clearly trying to tell me something without being very obvious about it. "It is," I smiled after a moment, "given how much she always misses me."

"I'm sure," he laughed. "See you Monday."

"Indeed," I replied, smile frozen on my face as the image winked out. For only then did it occur to me that Ladybug and I had, in effect, told Cap and Rena the two of us were going out of town on vacation.

Together.

"Merde," I said very quietly into the morning.

I closed my masked eyes and slid down the glass of the slider to the wood of the porch. If Cap knew, that meant Rena did, too; they were as tight a couple as they came. And the more that I thought about it, the guiltier I felt, for it was obvious that I was the one who'd blown everything apart by asking Alya to cover the fashion show. Having already figured out who Chat was would have made Ladybug's inadvertent slip harder to overlook.

"_Merde," _I said with emphasis as I pressed my masked face into my paws, my wild mane shifting forward to partially cover my self-recrimination.

I felt the door slide open behind me, and a moment later the warm caress as Marinette wrapped her arms around my costumed shoulders. "What's wrong?" she asked.

An ear twisted to her but I kept my face away for the moment. "I didn't mean to wake you," I demurred.

"I heard what sounded like a massive bird hitting the window," she said good naturedly. "Then saw the back of your costume as you sank to the ground and realized it wasn't a bird."

"Not a bird," I said morosely.

A gentle hand reached around and turned my chin toward her; in a moment, she'd seen the angst in my feline eyes, and cupped the side of my mask with the palm of her hand. "It can't be that bad."

I took a deep breath. "I think we blew your identity," I said without preamble.

Marinette sat back, and slowly nodded. "I thought I had, actually," she said softly. "It occurred to me on the train ride down that I'd been a bit too specific when we were asking them to cover for us."

"Milady," I said, feeling a bit distraught as I pulled her into my lap. "This is-"

"-no big deal," she said with a faint smile.

My masked feline eyes went wide with shock. "But... your Golden Rule!"

Marinette leaned up and kissed me on the spot of my nose the mask didn't quite cover. "I think that ship sailed when you and I broke it rather spectacularly this New Year's. And besides, they are our closest friends. If we can't trust them with this, I've got no business keeping them as holders."

I nodded, or at least as much as I could with her arms wrapped around my neck. "That was a factor in not pulling Rena after the fiasco at Christmas, wasn't it?"

"Yes," she replied. "I think of our foursome as the core of our team, and to be honest, it's a bit surprising we've been able to keep them from discovering our identities this long. Maybe my little Freudian slip was intended bring it out into the open finally."

"Are you absolutely sure about this?" I asked as I gazed into her deep blue eyes. I could see the answer there and smiled. "You are."

"I am," she said as she kissed that spot on my nose again. "Besides, it's not like I can make them _forget_ that they know our identities."

"You can't whip up a Lucky Charm for that?" I teased.

"Uh, no, kitty," she laughed.

"Well," I said, "I think that supports my observation that my conversation with her at the show was less that she wanted me to know I'd blown it and more that she would be a keeper of secrets. I know Nino will do the same." I leaned down to kiss Marinette, then pulled back. "To be honest, this will make it a bit easier for us in the long run."

"It will," she replied.

"I, for one, can't wait to_ finally_ have them to the apartment," I mused as I shifted slightly on the porch to gently place Marinette on her back. Leaning down to kiss her again, my bell tingled slightly with the movement. "I think you were still living at the bakery the last time we had a formal get-together," I added as I planted my paws on either side of her shoulders and slowly moved closer to her neck.

"You're right," Marinette breathed, shuddering slightly as I nibbled at her neck. "Chat... wh-wh-what are you doing...?"

"Moi?" I said with mock innocence. "Nothing at all," I answered as I leaned in and kissed her, gently, at the edge of her ear.

"Dear Lord," she whispered as her breath caught. "You are a _terrible_ liar..."


	55. Please, Please Say Yes

**Fifty-Five: Please, Please Say Yes**

_Author's Note: Chat moves forward with the secondary – and, in his opinion, equally as important – reason for the romantic weekend in Nice with Marinette. Marinette, in turn, has her own surprise for the special kitty in her life._

* * *

"Okay," I said as I removed my paws from her eyes. "Go ahead and open them."

I heard Marinette's sharp intake of breath. "Chat... my God, it's beautiful!"

Wrapping my arms around her, I hugged her to my chest and smiled; after rather intentionally... playing... with her all day, she had dozed off on the couch in the living room once more, allowing me to sneak up to the rooftop porch the bungalow sported. Normally used for late-night stargazing, I had given it a patented Chat makeover, installing my freestanding candle holders and tying my requisite rose bouquets to the wrought iron railing. Fresh rose petals were everywhere, filling the air with a pleasantly fragrant aroma that complimented the fresh-from-the-oven lasagna sitting atop a small table set for two.

Taking her by the paw, I guided her to a seat which I pulled out for her; as she sat down, I wondered if she'd recognize how intentionally I'd tried to make the space feel like that fateful night I'd wanted to surprise Ladybug with something special just for her. For even though Ladybug had ultimately broken my heart that night, it had led me to Marinette (and, of course, right back to Ladybug in the end). It was one of many touchpoints of our relationship, and one that I'd long held dear.

"This smells excellent," she said approvingly as she scooched in a bit so she could lean down to smell the dish.

Uncorking the red wine with a claw – the really, _really_ expensive one from the cellar at the mansion – I smiled as I began to decant it into her glass. "The sauce reduced all day, so it should be quite flavorful. And I snuck in a surprise ingredient. I hope you like it."

Taking the wineglass from my paw, she smiled. "I'm sure I will. I can't believe how good a chef you've become."

"I had an amazingly patient teacher," I reminded her as I held up my glass to hers. "Here's to the most beautiful, smartest, talented, loving woman I have ever been privileged enough to love."

"And here's to the cutest, brightest, most compassionate kitty to ever grace my doorstep and allow me to love," she said softly as our glasses tinkled together.

I took a sip and watched her face as she did likewise; her expression of pure bliss made me smile. "Please tell me this is _not_ the bottle I think it is."

"Okay," I replied as I started to serve the lasagna.

"Chat," she said. "You didn't break into your father's wine cellar again, did you?"

"A thief never kisses and tells," I laughed. "He won't miss it, believe me. There was enough dust on the bottle to make sandcastles anyway."

"You're playing with fire, kitty," she warned.

"And you are totally worth it," I reminded her.

We ate under the stars with the distant sounds of the surf crashing behind us, simply enjoying being in each other's company. For my part, as we got closer to the dessert part of the menu, my anxiety began to ramp up. The ring sitting in my baton felt like it was burning a hole through my costume, and despite how climate controlled my costume normally was, I felt a thin sheen of sweat across the part of my forehead not covered by the mask.

_What if she says no?_ I kept asking myself. _I mean, we've been dating for years now, but maybe she's going to think I'm moving too fast. And she's only known I'm Adrien for a few months—well, I guess that's not true, is it? Since technically she's known since college. _

_Oh my God! What if she _does_ say no?_

_Get a GRIP Chat! _

_You've fought akumas that nearly killed you._

_ This is doable… right? Right!_

As my feline eyes darted to the candles and recalled that evening long ago when I'd played the she-loves-me game with them, fear crept into my heart with no little amount of anxiety. The amazing woman sitting across from me was my entire reason for being, that much I knew; had I been presumptively arrogant to think she would simply say _yes_ when I asked? What if simply being together, like this, was as far as it went?

Suddenly the lasagna I'd slaved over all day felt like a solid indigestible mass in my stomach. Snatching my wineglass in a swift move, I drained it looking for some liquid courage; refilling it, I drained the second glass as if it were simply grape juice and not a vintage that could have likely paid someone else's college tuition.

Putting down my glass, I smiled at her as I held out the breadbasket, trying to mask my nervousness and for once having all of my model training fail me. Marinette had witnessed my wineglass maneuver – _swift, Chat, swift - _and her eyes caught the slight tremor in my arm as I held the basket out to her. Gently, she put her hand to mine to steady it.

"Chat," she said, her smile switching to one of concern, "what's wrong? I can hear your heart beating from this side of the table."

I swallowed hard and put the breadbasket down. _Now or never_, I thought, knowing my nerve was dangerously close to being lost.

Swiftly, I slid out of my chair and moved to hers, kneeling, tail snapping behind me. In a smooth motion, I slid the baton out from my back and then popped open the storage compartment. Carefully, I pulled out the velvet coated box, then stowed my baton. Looking up, my masked feline eyes caught her blue ones, which had gone wide; hoping that was a good thing, I took her hand in my paw, and then, very slowly, cracked open the box with the other, holding it out to her.

"Marinette," I said, as I watched her face closely; my feline hearing had caught her quickening pulse and I swallowed again. "I love you with every fiber of my being; you have given purpose to this kitty, and I want nothing more than to spend all nine of my lives by your side. I am, and have always been, yours."

I paused, and found I was having a hard time seeing her; blinking the tears of joy away, I could see she was misty eyed as well, one hand clasping at her wrap, twisting it in her fingers. "Milady - would you allow me to be your husband? Will you-" I paused again, slowly pulling the ring out from where it was safely nestled inside the fabric of the box.

The diamond caught in the candlelight, sparkling a white-blue as I held it up to her; it was too dark for her to see the fine details, but my night vision easily picked out the interwoven cat paw and ladybug on the inside of the ring. I'd thought I'd need to convince the jeweler we were huge fans of the Heroes of Paris only to find out it was a popular request – and that, in fact, there were a number of more overt homages to us out in the wild. That suited my purposes just fine, for other than the reveal to our best friends, we still needed to protect ourselves and our families.

Carefully, I held her hand with my paw and slowly, gently, slid the ring onto her finger. "Marinette, will you marry me?" I asked as I looked to her face.

Tears were streaming down her beautiful face as she held the ring up to the light. Turning her eyes back to me, she smiled and nodded. "Yes..." she said softly before launching herself out of her chair and wrapping her arms around me. "Yes, you old silly kitty. I'll marry you," she whispered in a feline ear. "I want to grow old with this black cat that managed, somehow, to wrap his paws around my heart."

Leaning back, she kissed me slowly, and I felt my tension beginning to ebb only to be replaced with a rush of desire. Passionately, I pressed my lips to hers, then started to kiss along her chin; I was halfway to a spot I now knew generally made her squeak like a mouse when Marinette suddenly pushed me away.

Puzzled and still on my knees, I watched her get up and look out toward the ocean. "Princess?" I asked, wondering what had just happened. Leaping to my feet, I went to her side and wrapped an arm around her waist, letting my tail snake around her ankle. "What's wrong?"

"I can't marry you," she said., wiping the tears from her face.

My feline ears shot straight up. "You-you what?" I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.

"I can't marry you," Marinette said again, sniffling.

The shock of her statement rippled across my soul; the roiling uncertainly that had taken up residence in my gut heaved and shifted, and my heart – oh, my poor heart. I'd known this was a possible outcome, but it had felt so remote – I'd been so damn confident – and now... now, I felt my heart crumbling to ash as if I'd pressed a Cataclysm-activated paw to it.

Stunned beyond words, I dropped the box I was still holding, hearing it fall to the porch as I wondered: where did I go from there. Stepping sideways, I gave her some space as I tried to get some semblance of control of my emotions.

"Okay," I replied softly. "I-I must have misread where we were in our relationship. It wasn't my intention to push you into something you would be uncomfortable doing."

"Chat, it's not that-"

"I don't really need an explanation," I continued, cutting her off as I looked away and tried to ignore the stinging of the tears that were threatening in my feline eyes. "I… I… guess I just wanted to make you happy. If that's not with me, I… I get it."

"Chat-"

I turned and moved to the small table, picking up the bottle of wine in a paw. "I just hope we can still be friends – that I've not ruined everything tonight."

"_Dammit_ Chat, would you hold on-"

"Don't wait up," I said as I leapt over the railing and vaulted into the night.

Landing in the sandy dunes in front of the cottage, I simply took off, running as fast as my Miraculous-charged legs could go. Even on the wide, sandy beach, that was still fairly fast, and in moments I'd put significant distance between myself and my misery back at the cottage. The tide was in, so I was forced to run on the more loosely packed portion of the beach, but I truly didn't care. My world had been upended once more; the only thing that was surprising about it was that I'd not seen it coming. As the kilometers stretched behind me, I berated myself for any number of things, questioning everything I had done that had brought us to that wonderfully terrible moment.

And yet, the joy I had seen in her face when she saw the ring – that was _real_. Just as real as her rejection a few breaths later. It was so head-spinningly fast, I felt like I'd been in one of those three-camera sitcoms. The only thing missing had been the laugh track emphasizing the enormity of my misjudgment.

I paused atop another dune and drained the last of the ten-thousand-dollar bottle before hurling it with all of my Chat strength into the waves. My night vision caught the reflection of the glass as it skipped over the water once, twice, three times before sinking out of sight. As it disappeared, I similarly slipped down into a cat-crouch on the sand, and just sat there, watching the waves.

And cried.

Pulling my knees up to my chest, I buried my masked face in them and sobbed uncontrollably, the stress leading up to the evening and the rejection that came from it overwhelming all emotional controls I had. A tiny part of me saw the tragic comedy that I had now, in fact, been rejected by Ladybug twice. That spelled _loser_ in any dictionary I knew.

A feline ear picked up a whisper on the wind, and a significant part of me wanted to leap away – away from _her_ and all of the pain. But I knew this confrontation was inevitable, so I sat, waiting, with a massive hollowed-out feeling deep inside of me.

Ladybug came jogging up the dune and didn't slow in the least until she landed on her knees beside me. Before I knew what was happening, she'd engulfed me in a massive hug, holding me tight to her chest. "Damn it to _Hell_, kitty," she swore loudly as she rocked us back and forth. "I thought we had gotten through the snap-judgement phase with you."

"I haven't a clue what you're talking about," I said morosely. "And if that is supposed to make me feel better-"

"Kitty," she said softly, twisting my face up to meet her eyes, which I did reluctantly. "You're not getting off the hook that easily."

"Hook?" I asked, blinking.

Ladybug held up her gloved hand, and my masked eyes widened to see the ring on her finger. "This means _yes_," she said, "which apparently you overlooked."

Now thoroughly confused, I looked from the ring to her eyes, then back to the ring. "You're still wearing it? And how is it there when you are transformed?"

"I am," she said. "And it's visible because I _want_ it to be. I love you," she said, twisting my head back to hers, "sincerely love you, and have for a long, long time. And rather desperately want to be your wife."

"But-"

"If you had let me finish my thought, I was _going_ to say, 'Marinette can't marry Chat. We need to figure out a way for Chat to marry Ladybug... and for Adrien to marry Marinette.'"

I blinked. "I proposed to _you_," I said, feeling somewhat dense. "I wasn't making a distinction between your alter-egos. I mean, you're _you_ whether you have the mask or not."

"I know that, Chat," she smiled softly. "It's the rest of Paris that doesn't." Swinging around to sit beside me, she pulled me close. "We are a couple – hopefully soon a married one – no matter the guise. But we do have to think through how to make this work for the public. And, frankly, as long as Hawkmoth is still around, we need to protect our identities. Having Chat publicly date Marinette is one thing, but marrying her… well, that's all I meant."

"I guess I follow," I said, though I wasn't entirely sure I did. "You want Chat to break up with Marinette, then?"

"I'm not sure yet," she smiled again. "My point – badly made, admittedly – was we needed to _think through it_, that's all." Slowly she ran her hand through my wild mane. "That fur brain of yours melted down, didn't it?' she asked quietly.

I nodded.

"I'm so very sorry," she said, snuggling into my shoulder. "You know me – I like to think aloud. I do some of my best planning that way, but I didn't consider what it would do to you in the moment." Smiling sadly, she sighed softly, "Well done, Mari."

Ladybug pulled my head to hers. "All the times I rejected you – I should have realized you'd be at your most vulnerable at that moment. By the time I saw the panic and pain in your eyes, I knew what I'd done."

"Can you blame me?" I asked quietly. "To my feline ears it sounded like a rejection. A confusing one, but a rejection nonetheless."

"Oh kitty," she said, her eyes getting misty once more. "Kitty, my sweet kitty; that was never my intent," she added softly, continuing to hold me. "I'm truly sorry."

A tiny ray of sunshine appeared in my heart. "So… you're not breaking up with me?"

"No, Chat." She leaned around and kissed me, then leaned back. "I intend to marry you. Whether you like it or not."

"Okay," I said, my fur brain still feeling a bit muddled. After a moment, I felt a smile start to form on my masked visage. "_Okay_," I said with more enthusiasm. "I… I have to admit, this is not how I thought tonight would work out."

"We always do things the hard way, don't we kitty?" she asked, sighing again. "I'm truly sorry."

Pulling her around to me I held her to my chest. "You gave me one helluva scare. I thought I'd messed up again - big time."

"You?" She smiled. "You've been nothing but the purrfect partner – the perfect companion." Ladybug got a sly look on her face and continued. "Let me apologize to you."

Feeling like I was missing something, I said: "I think you already did."

Ladybug laughed. "You are adorable when you're clueless," she smiled as she did something with her hands at the front of her costume.

My feline eyes bugged out when the silver of a zipper caught what little light there was. I think my jaw dropped open when my feline ears heard the metal-on-metal sound as she slowly pulled. "When—when did _that_ appear?"

"Tonight," she said. "Tikki and I had been talking about changes, and I planned on surprising you with it tonight — that is, until you stole my thunder." She caressed the side of my face with a gloved hand. "I thought it was appropriate to give my kitty a treat, given how he's treated me this weekend."

My pulse began to pound in my ears, for this was something I had long dreamed of; all these years of fighting Hawkmoth side-by-side with her clad in that amazingly form fitting costume had created no shortage of teenaged daydreams. Hell, I'd had more than a few as an adult, too. But with Ladybug so close to me, filling my feline nose with her exotic scent, I knew this was no dream. The touch of her gloved hand as it traced the edge of my mask sizzled against my bare skin.

It was one amazingly sensual apology.

I swallowed, finding my voice after a fashion. "Uh," seemed to be about all I could get out. "I mean… here? Right now? On the sand dune?"

"That's kind of the idea, yes."

"Milady, I'm not prepared – I mean, not that I don't want this, but I don't have—"

"Got you covered," Ladybug leaned up and whispered into a feline ear, before nibbling at the edge. I shuddered at the sensation as she pulled away and added, "After all, planning is kind of part of my job."

How I had gone from the depths of despair to the heights of joy in the space of an hour was a mystery of love that I decided I didn't particularly care to examine at that moment. Reaching a paw out, I tentatively hooked a claw into the tiny hole of the zipper pull, and then looked to her deep blue eyes. Watching her nod, I smiled for the first time in a bit.

"Milady," I observed, as I did what I always did for Ladybug – lending a paw at just the right moment – before pulling her to me. "I cannot disagree…"


	56. Yes, Dear

**Fifty-Six: Yes, Dear**

_Author's Note: Carapace and Rena Rouge make the rounds while they fill in for the vacationing Heroes of Paris._

* * *

_Special Note: A short turtle/fox interlude while I wrap up my Camp NaNo July project. Chat and Ladybug will be back from vacation next week – I promise._

* * *

Rena Rouge snuggled into Carapace high atop the glass dome of the Grand Palais, letting her fox ears brush the shoulder of the turtle that had been her partner in more ways than one for longer than she cared to remember. His reassuring presence was something she'd come to rely on; more so when the dawning recognition of what the future held for the two of them had hit some six weeks earlier.

Looking down to where his gloved hand was upon hers, both resting gently on the now quite-visible evidence of their love, she still _felt_ all the fears that she supposed all new parents experienced - though not all carried the extra burden of part-time superhero duties piled on top of motherhood. It had only been Chat Noir's calm insistence that she could do it that had partially eased her fears; combined with the certainty she truly had the support of her friends and future husband, she'd begun to sleep a bit easier these past few nights. She'd seen the feline superhero use those empathetic talents on innumerable akuma victims; having them turned upon her brought a welcome jolt of confidence that she'd sorely needed – something Chat had, of course, known at the time.

_Chat Noir_.

She smiled at what Carapace had told her earlier, at how even now, when they were reasonably certain Chat knew they were on to his civilian identity – and, possibly, Ladybug's, too - their friend had continued to try and play the oblivious feline they now knew had never truly been the case. She wondered what kind of a reunion the four of them would have once the lovebirds got back from Nice but figured it would be something along the lines of welcome relief now that secrets had been revealed all around.

It made her glad she'd not completely blown it earlier when she'd been under Manon's control.

Turning her attention back to the sparkling night lights of the city, she'd privately been thankful that their patrols had been exceedingly quiet. Not that she wasn't up to the task of protecting Paris; rather, she'd always wanted to have the same sort of quiet, superhero moment with Carapace that she'd documented on her blog repeatedly between Chat and Ladybug. It was funny in a way, for she'd known – always known, really — that those two would wind up together, even if that messy, complicated fall-for-the-wrong-alter-ego thing had threatened to derail it any number of times.

That had never been a problem for _her_, for nearly from the moment she'd been locked in that animal cage with Nino, Alya had known she'd found her soulmate. It became locked in stone when he'd taken his first spin as the turtle and had bravely fought off her akumatized sister to save her; it hadn't been hard to see through his mask to the love that had driven him to take up the mantle of hero. For his part, Nino had figured out pretty quickly who was beneath the fox ears, though it wasn't until college that the two had finally – albeit secretly - broken Ladybug's edict and _officially_ shared their secret identities with each other.

It was also how she knew that, despite Ladybug's fears, knowing who her partner was would likely only strengthen her relationship with the feline. That they had been so blind to it for so long was the real tragedy – no, that was too harsh, she thought. They _had_ figured it out, hadn't they? Blind perhaps only in the sense that it took so long for the barriers to drop enough they could see who the other truly was.

Sighing, she snapped her Fox Phone open and saw the hour was far later than she'd realized; it was rapidly becoming Sunday morning, though technically, it wasn't a real issue per se. But her editor had sent a long list of changes on her most recent article – an expose on counterfeit fashion, not normally a subject that was in her wheelhouse, though it had meant scoring an exclusive with Gabriel Agreste – and with an early deadline on Monday, she really needed a few hours of sleep before working on the piece. For even if Chat and Ladybug were due back the following day, she was hoping for one last spin around the city as Rena – as her pregnancy progressed, she knew her chances to savoir the experience would become more limited. So work first, then play; not a bad trade, on the whole, if it meant you could still don the mask and ears at the end.

"Babe, we've got to call it a night," she sighed.

Carapace leaned down and kissed her cheek. "Tired, fox of my heart?"

"You've been hanging around Chat too much," she replied with a smile. "No, I could stay out here forever; I think I'm finally understanding _why_ Chat prowls the way he does. The freedom we have – when Hawkmoth is quiet, obviously – is a bit intoxicating." Pushing herself up, she stood and put a gloved hand out to help her partner. "But I have to be a responsible adult tomorrow. And _you_ need to finish that new mix for your label."

She saw him roll his begoggled eyes. "Yes, dear," he laughed as he intertwined his gloved fingers in hers.

"Don't do that," she laughed. "We're not an old married couple."

"Yet," he reminded her with a gentle kiss on her lips. "Look, about that..." He took both of her gloved hands into hers. "I'd like to get married," Carapace said softly.

Rena rolled her eyes. "I know _that_," she laughed.

Cap flushed darker, something that she found quite endearing. "What I meant was... I'd like to, well, make it official. You know." He paused, and she tried not to chuckle as he pulled a very Adrien-like move and ran a hand to the back of his neck. "Uh... before."

Rena couldn't help but laugh; Carapace was totally adorable when he was flustered. "We had talked about pushing it off, hadn't we?"

"Yeah," he replied. "I don't want to wait any longer, babe." He let her go and started to pace a bit. "Chat convinced me before they left for Nice that everything's cool now – but for a while there, I was worried that what happened in January might have thrown us off track permanently. Then with our kidlet-"

"Yes," Rena interrupted, reaching out for him. "Let's do it."

Carapace turned fully toward her. "Really?" he asked, not quite wanting to believe what he was hearing.

"Yeah. I mean, we have to wait for my best Ladybug to get back; and you need your Best Chat." She smiled as she pulled him in for a kiss. "I think they will make themselves available as soon as we ask them..." Rena said before trailing off.

Carapace tilted his head. "I've seen that look before," he said with a half-smile. "You're as bad as Ladybug when you get to planning. What are you cooking up _now_?"

Rena laughed. "How cool would it be to get married like this?"

"Like... this?" Carapace said, frowning. "You mean... as heroes? I don't know if Ladybug would go for it..."

"Yeah!" Rena replied excitedly. "I think she might. Of all people, she'd understand how it's almost a dream-come-true for me. It would be on the down low, of course, and we can do a full ceremony with our family after the kidlet is born. What do you think? Would you do it?" She paused, then added, "For me?"

Carapace smiled as he pulled her into his arms. "For you? Yes, dear." He smiled wider. "But _you_ have to convince Ladybug. Chat'll be easy – he'll do whatever Ladybug decides."

"I accept that challenge," Rena laughed. "You two are more similar that I realized," she added as they started to trot to the end of the roof for their return home.

"True," the turtle chuckled as they leapt into the night together. "We both know when we have it good. Believe me."


	57. Surprise!

**Fifty-Seven: Surprise!**

_Author's Note: Back from their long weekend, Chat and Ladybug attempt to clean up their little identity reveal mess with their friends._

* * *

"So... you know."

As I sat on the edge of a random roof in southwest Paris, it was more of a statement than a question to Carapace – the man who'd been my first true friend all those years ago at Dupont and now was one of the closest. I watched as his hooded face darkened a little, and then he gave me that half-smile I'd gotten used to seeing when he was embarrassed.

"Yeah," he said simply, his green-sheathed legs kicking in the air.

I smiled. Ladybug and I had only been back in Paris for a few days before we'd decided to do a split patrol with Cap and Rena Rouge. It was something we'd started not long after they'd become semi-regular holders, a chance for us to keep them loose as superheroes; once they'd become permanent holders, we'd stepped up the schedule to a few times a month, with an eye toward having them possibly take over a patrol night for us. That, of course, was before Rena made her joyous announcement; I'd already spoken to Luka about possibly filling in for her, though as popular as his band was becoming, it was often hard to know when he was even in Paris these days. Despite that, he'd agreed to help whenever he could.

Tonight's patrol was more to deal with the fallout of our best friends discovering our super-hero identities, and we'd predictably each taken our respective half of the relationship before setting out in opposite directions for the evening. I'd decided I wanted to have the "talk" over the second-best coffee in the city – literally – and had led Carapace to a café Adrien had discovered during a photo shoot in a nearby studio. The smell of roasting coffee was wafting up in divine waves as I sipped from the takeaway mug and looked at my friend over the rim. "Surprised?"

"Not in retrospect, no," Carapace replied as he pushed down his hood to expose his shaved head. Rubbing it with a gloved hand, he continued. "Once we figured it out, it was easy to match the pattern of Adrien's absences with Chat's appearances. But you – both of you, for that matter – were pretty good. Rena didn't puzzle it out until the day you asked her to do the photoshoot."

My masked eyes widened. "Wait - you knew earlier?"

Carapace smiled. "Dude, there's _not_ a lot of space between Chat and Adrien. Besides, I've been fighting alongside you now for years; when you know what to look for, it's not hard to see those silly ears on top of your normal mop of hair."

"Hey!" I said, automatically running a paw to my mane. "I'll have you know these are part of the gig! They actually _do_ something!"

Carapace laughed. "Yeah. Drive your female fans wild."

I rolled my eyes. "Well, I'm sure that's just an unfortunate side effect," I joked, though I was well aware of how Marinette felt about them. And how she could use them against me with that devilish touch of hers...

"Right," he laughed again as he sipped his coffee, then went sober. "So... I have to ask..."

"Is this the end of your run as Carapace?" I replied.

"Yeah," he nodded. "Or Chat, for that matter."

"The question of the evening, that." I looked up at the stars. "The short answer is, I'm not ready to give up being Chat Noir; even I _were_, Ladybug and I know we have unfinished business with Hawkmoth. Handing off to someone new right now would put them at a grave disadvantage. Believe me, LB and I spent a lot of time discussing this on our vacation-"

Cap snorted his coffee. "Is that what we're calling it these days?" he asked.

I glared at him for a moment before continuing. "It took a lot of years for her to trust me with her identity. It's actually Alya's fault that we know. I wasn't ready to reveal myself to Marinette when those damning photos of me with Ladybug hit her blog."

"You know, I wondered what you'd gone through with Marinette," he said. "I'm sorry, dude."

"Well, it was my fault in the first place. The upshot was it sort of forced the issue on us."

The look of astonishment on Carapace's face was slightly humorous, with his jaw open slightly and goggled eyes wide. "How on _earth_ did you manage to keep her from knowing who you were? Especially while living together?"

"You get creative," I smiled. "But it doesn't hurt that Mari loves tight magic black leather."

His eyes grew wider. "You... you stay transformed when-"

Flushing slightly, I quickly continued my thought. "_Any_way, the bottom line is that we realized there was more of a risk to _not_ knowing who was under each respective mask. Apparently, there was a little episode back when we were still in Dupont that Ladybug thought had proved the _opposite _point, but over the years since she's come to the view that secrets have their own price."

"What sort of episode?"

"I couldn't tell you," I replied honestly. "It was one of those mind-numbing broken timeline incidents where Ladybug wound up being the only one to recall what happened. She's told me enough that I know I was somehow akumatized and destroyed the world as a result."

"You...?" Carapace gasped. "I can't believe it. Not in a million years."

"I was a lot younger at the time, so it's possible. My point though is that the akumatization was the result of secrets – and once she realized some secrets are better known than not, it changed her whole view on her Superhero Golden Rule."

"Ah," he smiled, looking a bit relieved. "So, you're not retiring... and we're not losing our Miraculous?"

"Exactly."

Relaxing more, Carapace drained the last of his coffee. "I was more worried than Rena," he confided. "She thought Ladybug would keep us on the payroll."

"The two of you are our closest, most trusted friends," I said, fist bumping him. "And there's no way you're getting out of covering for us when we want to take time off."

Cap chuckled. "Ah. Truth will out."

"Always." I snapped open my baton to check the time. "I'm going to call it a night, but you're welcome to stay out longer."

Stretching fully, Carapace laughed. "I'm gonna turn in too. Rena's not sleeping well these nights, actually. She can't get comfortable, especially since she's got to go to the bathroom six times a night now." As he stood, he smiled crookedly. "Each time she does, she reminds me it's my fault, too. So I'm not getting much sleep, either."

I narrowed my masked eyes. "Speaking as someone who aced Bio, I'd feel obligated to remind her that it 'takes two to tango."

Carapace laughed. "If I've learned anything, it's not to pick a fight with your beloved when the hormones are raging."

"Good point," I chuckled as I extended my baton. "See you around, turtle," I called out as I leapt into the evening.

My feline hearing picked up his laughter as he leapt away in the opposite direction. Smiling, I helicoptered over to the next rooftop and then began a relatively modest trot across the darkened rooftops of the city toward our apartment. The steady rhythm of my rubber soled boots hitting the tiles did it's usual magic and created a Zen-like mood, simultaneously relaxing me while heightening my senses. Sights, sounds and smells of Paris as it settled in for the night washed over me, once more reminding me how special my transformation abilities were – and how much more _connected_ to my city I was as a result.

One smell stood out among many, and a wide feline grin broke out on my masked face when I realized I was passing fairly close to the Dupain-Cheng Bakery. Shifting my direction slightly, I hit the side of the building and dropped down to the street using a downspout; landing in a crouch, I took a deeper sniff, and was surprised at how more detailed my appreciation of Tom's famous bread was.

I debated for a moment taking the stealthy tact and stealing the loaves straight from the oven, but decided my girlfriend would likely disown me. Opting instead for the side entrance to the bakery kitchen, I tapped my claws against the wood. While it wasn't entirely unusual for Tom to be baking as such a late hour, my masked eyes flew wide when Marinette pulled open the door.

"Chat! Thank _God_. Get in here."

"Princess?" I asked as she tugged me through the door an into the warm embrace of the kitchen at full boil. Before I knew what was going on, she'd tossed me an apron and stationed me in front of a mixing bowl surrounded by smaller dishes of ingredients. Unlike my kitten days, I was far more comfortable in the kitchen as a grown feline and easily determined I was to make oatmeal raisin cookies. Still unsure of _why_ I was making cookies at that hour of the evening, I picked up the spatula and started to blend together the ingredients.

As Marinette quietly muttered to herself over what looked to be a pound cake of some sort, I tried to get my bearings. Plucking the metal bowl from the counter, I wandered as I mixed and quickly realized her parents were nowhere in sight; every surface of the kitchen, however, had some baking project in progress, and a quick peek into the oven told me it was full of bread, pastries _and _cookies.

That brought a frown to my face, for on a few other occasions, I had encountered this same phenomenon from Marinette. When something was troubling her deeply, she often made a loaf of bread so she could kneed out her troubles; once the golden baguette came out of our oven at home, she'd have solved the knotty problem. And if she hadn't... well, that's where my purr therapy generally came in. Along with certain other feline talents.

I had never seen her do more than one project at a time, though.

"Princess," I said cautiously. "How was patrol? You seem to have finished earlier than-"

She whirled on me. "Madagascar Vanilla! Who on earth would come up with a recipe that requires _Mada-frigging-gascar _Vanilla!" she cried, shaking a spoon at me.

My feline reflexes managed to avoid most of the batter, save for on splotch that landed on my arm. "What happened, Mari?" I asked.

Bustling past me, she continued as if I'd not said anything. "Jamaican would be cheaper. Better too; but maybe I could swap it for something else-"

"Marinette?"

"Dammit! Where did Papa put the baking soda?"

"On the counter to your left," I sighed.

"Right," she nodded as she whistled past me, trailing a million exotic scents in her wake. _That_ told me she'd been at it for a few hours now, which made my masked eyes go wider. Patrolling often took us to midnight; I'd knocked off at ten, which in itself was unusual. Ladybug ending early was extraordinary.

"Eggs? Brown or white?" she asked me.

Putting down my bowl, I put my hands on my hips. "Marinette..."

"Good idea. I'll use the mixture instead-"

"_Marinette!_" I growled. "What the Hell is going on?"

My girlfriend – well, technically she was my fiancé now, right? - blinked and then looked at me as though she were seeing me for the first time that evening. "She wants to get married," Marinette said simply as she sagged against the counter.

"Alya?" I asked as I swooped in beside her and held her to me. "We already knew that."

Marinette put her head into her hand. "Yes... but she wants to get married. In costume."

I cocked my mane slightly. "Themed weddings are all the rage right now," I replied, tapping a claw to my chin. "Though Alya doesn't strike me as one to dress as a princess-"

"Chat," Marinette said slowly. "She wants a superhero wedding."

"Oh," was all I managed to say. "Like... superhero-superhero?"

"Like turtle-and-fox hero, yeah," she replied softly, her eyes darting to the door that led to the residence. "With a certain cat and bug as best man and lady, respectively."

My ears went straight up. "We... that's... there's no way..." I started, before I saw the look on her face. "Princess - _Milady_! You didn't say _yes_, did you?"

"It's worse than that..." she moaned as she pressed her face into her palms. "I said we'd join her."


	58. Dreaming Up A Plan

**Fifty-Eight: Dreaming Up A Plan**

_Author's Note: Chat grapples with the unintended consequences of Ladybug's conversation with Rena – and discovers the only thing crazier might well be what his sleep-deprived feline brain concocts. Of course, Ladybug would never go for it… right?_

* * *

Three dozen chocolate chip cookies, six loafs of French bread and a dozen croissants later, I was laying on the couch with Marinette curled on top of me, thankfully, we'd _finall_y gotten back to the apartment. It had been Hell getting the Bakery kitchen back in order so Tom could start to work in just a few hours; for the first time in forever, I actually felt like an exhausted kitty. I felt bad for Plagg, knowing he was running on the (admittedly healthy portion of) Camembert I'd given him prior to heading out to meet Carapace many, many hours earlier.

But it had required extensive purr therapy and a half-liter of her favorite ice cream before I'd managed to get her calmed down; my bleary feline eyes wandered to what was left of the second half-liter as it melted atop the coffee table, knowing it had finally provided enough carbs to allow Marinette to nod off to sleep. Not wanting to disturb her had led to my current predicament, though in truth I could have probably dropped my transformation without waking her; each time I got close to trying, though, Mari would stir and sleepily trace some part of my costume with her finger for a moment before gently starting to snore once more.

I figured I could take one for the team and pay Plagg later with the extremely expensive stuff.

Our respective Miraculous had blessed us with such cranked metabolisms we could have likely plowed through the massive pile of baked goods currently sitting on the breakfast bar behind me and _still_ been hungry, though my stomach rebelled slightly at the thought at eating anything else. For it was actually possible I'd polished off nearly a dozen of those oatmeal raisin cookies before we'd even begun to clean up in earnest, and as much as I loved them, I had a feline it would be a long while before I touched another.

Turning my tired masked eyes to the digits above our wall oven, I had trouble focusing on the time displayed before realizing I truly didn't need to know that it was nearly three. Sighing, I knew we both had to go to our respective offices in just a few hours; sleep was not coming easily for me, though, despite the massive yawns that threatened to dislocate my jaw. Not one to normally get stiff when transformed, I nonetheless had a tight muscle in my back and very, very carefully managed to stretch ever so slightly beneath Marinette without waking her. Popping the offending muscle felt amazingly good, and for a moment I thought it would be just enough to take the edge off and allow me to finally drop off.

As soon as I closed my feline eyes, though, my thoughts traitorously returned to the bombshell she'd dropped a few hours earlier. Sighing again, my masked eyes snapped open once more as I put a protective arm over Marinette; reluctantly, I finally allowed myself to revisit the strange situation we now found ourselves in – if anything could be _stranger_ than my lounging on a couch in a cat-themed super-suit with my gorgeous fiancé slowly drooling on my chest.

I wasn't surprised that Alya had asked Marinette to be her Maid of Honor, for their friendship was as old and as deep as mine was with Nino. The two were nearly sisters in my estimation, and though Mari and I hadn't discussed it yet, I fully expected Alya to have the same role at our wedding. Nino had already asked me to be his Best Man, but that had been a request of _Adrien_; this unusual wrinkle where Alya had decided to throw a superhero wedding was something I'd not seen coming, and based on Marinette's reaction, neither had she.

What _had_ surprised me was Ladybug agreeing; what _floored_ me was this double-wedding concept that had resulted. Pressing my nose in Marinette's hair, I tried to sort through my conflicting issues on all of it. I did want to be part of Nino's wedding, that much wasn't in doubt; doing it as Chat, though? For once in my tenure as the feline superhero, I wasn't sure it was the right call. As a younger kitten, I would have defelinely jumped at the chance for my alter-ego to do something so public, but this seemed wrong – like I would take _away_ from my friend's special day. It was only partially ameliorated with the thought that all four of us would be transformed.

There was no small part of me that desperately wanted Chat to be able to marry Ladybug officially, though, and those emotions – the culmination of years of dreams, really – were hard to set aside in order to consider the situation dispassionately. And, if I were being honest, I wanted that moment between us to be a very special, very _private_ experience, no matter how close I felt I was to Nino and Alya. I couldn't deny I was a tad put out to have to share the spotlight, though being angry with Ladybug for accepting on my behalf couldn't have been further from my thoughts.

Marinette had given me the details between pastry rounds; though she had been reluctant to do a public superhero wedding initially, Alya had convinced her with a clever justification: if Hawkmoth knew we were already married to our soulmates, he might be less likely to seek out our civilian partners to use as leverage, knowing they were already masked up and ready to fight. It had been a carefully calculated argument, and in the heat of the moment, Ladybug had accepted it _and_ the resulting commitment for us to participate. I found myself smiling once more at the simplicity of the argument.

It _had_ failed to account for the already public Chat/Marinette relationship, though, and this more than anything was what had sent Marinette into her frenzy of baking. For in order to marry Chat as Ladybug, Marinette would need to dump Chat (especially since Chat wouldn't have it the other way around). Seeing as though we'd not made any significant progress on the Adrien/Marinette front, she'd uncharacteristically had a brain freeze with respect to digging ourselves out of this self-created mess. Looking at her beautiful long hair, I managed to free up a paw to gently run my claws through it and wondered if there was any way I could come up with something myself. Planning tended to be more in my partner's department, the more complicated the better.

Yawning once more, I wondered if there was any part of what Alya had done to us over Christmas that I could use. Certainly, the photos of Chat and Ladybug getting down on the rooftop of Dupont had gone viral, and from my prowling on the Ladyblog's discussion boards, how it had quickly fanned the flames of speculation that the two of us had unresolved feelings for each other. (I also learned it had a term – _LadyNoir_ – which my partner hated more passionately than my calling her "bugaboo." Purrsonally, I'd fallen in love with the _MariChat_ designation that had been spawned after Alya had caught our first trip to Nice.)

Having lived in the fashion industry for my entire life, though, I knew the value of a solid reputation – and how Chat would suffer in the eyes of Parisians if It were assumed he truly had two-timed Marinette; the same would be true for Marinette, if she were viewed as having treated Chat badly in any way. As a fledgling designer, she wouldn't be able to take the hit of some sort of messy breakup, especially if it happened to be a Hero of Paris. I squeezed my masked eyes shut again, this time against the nascent headache that was threatening to appear, for this truly seemed like a conundrum from which there was no exit. There was a reason I had the ring and not the earrings.

Somewhat sleepily, a funny thought occurred to me — It was a shame Adrien couldn't date Ladybug. Then _he_ could marry her and _I_ could have Marinette. Except, as sleep finally took ahold of me, I had both of them anyway… didn't I? My tired feline brain couldn't remember.

Dreams of Ladybug and I enjoying a late evening repast at a café gave wave to me frolicking in a tall field of grass, merrily chasing after Marinette who shifted between being Ladybug, Multimouse and herself as I pursued her. Another heartbeat and I was cuddled next to her on the beach at Nice, my transformation dropped for once as the two of us enjoyed the sight of the moonlit waves crashing upon the sand below us. One final shift and a much younger version of me was on my favorite rooftop in Paris, surrounded by my candles and rose petals, holding a long stem in my paws.

"I love another boy," Ladybug was saying, and for once my heart didn't break at the memory.

"I know," I replied with my best Chat smile. "It's me."

Ladybug looked at me and put a hand to her hip (oddly, it occurred to me that's not how I remembered it the first time) and raised an eyebrow. "Chat, I'm serious. I don't want to lie to you."

"You're not," I smiled wider. Carefully, I handed her the rose and then pulled her a bit closer to me.  
"Let me prove it to you."

"What on Earth-"

"Plagg – claws in!"

The resulting green flash of transformation bled through my masked eyes, which shot open just as the wave travelled over my head and removed said facial covering. In the semi-darkness of the living room, and sans my night vision, it was hard for me to tell if my impromptu detransformation had woken Marinette; she was still snuggled up against me and though she shifted slightly, remained asleep. The darkness also hid the fact that I was clad in Gabriel boxer briefs, a nod to my original assumption that patrol was to have ended with us cozily ensconced in bed, not baking at an ungodly hour; the slight chill to the apartment resulted in goosebumps and my immediate instinct to don the feline ears once more.

It took a moment for me to see the glowing eyes of Plagg as he floated next to me. "Did I detransform from my dream?" I asked, murky thoughts asserting themselves.

"Cheese," was the only reply, and I watched the eyes float away from me and toward my end of the apartment.

"Not helpful," I whispered, but I couldn't blame him. Yet I was nearly certain I'd not been awake when I'd uttered the magic phrase. It was a little scary to think I could subconsciously control it that way, adding yet another item to my list of things to discuss with Plagg. If and when he ever returned from getting his much-delayed dinner.

Habit had me reaching for my baton to check the time – my civilian eyesight was incapable of reading the oven clock – and checked myself as I grasped at empty air. Shaking my head, I realized I seemed to have crossed over into that space where being Chat was second nature, and wondered if through all the years of keeping a secret identity I'd actually lost track of who Adrien truly was. That made me shake my head harder, for without question I knew the answer: Chat had _always_ been me. Adrien would always be there, of course, but the more I thought about it, my civilian alter-ego had been simply a restrained version of my feline purrsonality. Polite, respectful, more-or-less compliant, and loyal to a fault.

Actually, that kind of summarize both sides of me.

Marinette shifted again, and this time I felt her head pop up. "Chat?" she asked sleepily. "What time is it?"

"I have no idea, Princess. Maybe four?"

I heard her yawn, and then felt a probing finger on a pectoral. "Uh… who are you and what did you do to my kitty?" she asked playfully.

"I'm your civilian fiancé," I laughed, "and I'm giving my feline alter-ego a chance to recharge."

Marinette pressed her head to my chest again and started to draw tiny circles with her finger along a rib. I tried not to giggle uncontrollably – Chat wouldn't, right? – as she sighed. "I've made a mess of things, haven't I?"

"Not intentionally," I replied. "But I will admit, I've spent most of the night trying to puzzle out how we do it." I chuckled slightly – _not_ at the subtle tickling, mind you – and added: "I did have one thought just before I fell asleep: if only Ladybug could marry Adrien! Then we'd solve this whole crisis. Otherwise, you're just gonna have to break up with Chat, but to be honest, I'm not sure how he'll take it."

Marinette paused her finger, and I could feel her hair lift away from my chest. "Adrien… that's brilliant!"

"What is?" I replied, a bit confused. "I was kidding. It wasn't a plan."

"Maybe it should be," she said thoughtfully.

I frowned in the darkness. "Why do I feel like you've suddenly hatched a Lucky Charm to end all Lucky Charms…?" I asked.

"And then some," she laughed as she rolled off of me. "Time to get up, kitty. We've got work to do."

"Should I be worried?" I asked as I swung my legs down and sat beside her in the dark. "And will it involve my tail?" I added, referencing the insane number of times it had been a key ingredient in the Charm.

"Absolutely," she laughed. "On both counts."


	59. Schedule Interrupted

**Fifty-Nine: Schedule Adjusted**

_Author's Note: Mulling over Ladybug's plans for the superhero wedding, Chat's alter-ego unexpectedly has a mini-crisis to deal with at work._

* * *

I arrived at House of Gabriel twenty minutes before the first meeting of the day. Landing in a crouch atop the building, I paused for a moment to let the full plan Marinette had weaved out of nothing percolate through my fur brain a little bit more. As crazy as it had initially seemed, I had to admit it was about as brilliant as the very best of her Lucky Charms – and if we managed to pull it off, we'd still wind up married, too. As I stood to walk toward the rooftop stairwell entrance, I shook my mane a little; there were still some of the finer details to work out, but I knew I had the first part of the script to execute.

Considering how little sleep I'd gotten, I needed caffeine; a meter or so from the door, I pulled out my baton and confirmed I had enough time for a quick side trip. For without the elixir of life, there was a good chance I'd screw up Ladybug's plan out of the gate.

Keeping the baton handy, I turned and ran to the edge of the roof, helicoptering up and away; my destination wasn't all that far, but to save time I ran full-tilt along the rooftop of the first building I hit, then leapt upward into a double-twist to land on the next one without breaking my stride. Tail flapping behind me, I crossed a final alley in a vault-to-extended-baton move, arching downward toward a particular downspout I was able to nab with a paw; a gentle release and I'd dropped to street level in a cat-crouch beside the kitchen door of the Dupain-Cheng Bakery – the very same one I'd entered some fourteen hours and change earlier.

Tapping my claws against the door, I stood as Sabine swung it wide. "Madame," I smiled.

"Good morning, Chat," Sabine replied, a warm smile on her face. "Are you here for breakfast? I'm afraid we've sold the last of your favorite quiche."

I shook my wild mane. "Just coffee today, if I can. Ladybug and I were out quite late last night, and I need something to jumpstart my brain."

Sabine looked concerned for a moment as she beckoned me into the kitchen. "Everything all right?"

"Oh yeah," I nodded as I leapt to an open stool and perched as was my custom, tail twitching in anticipation of the special blend of coffee Tom had perfected. Unsuccessfully stifling a yawn, I continued. "I'm more worried about the day ahead for my civilian alter-ego, to be honest."

"Well, let me see if we can't save you," she laughed. "Stay right there."

I nodded again and let my masked eyes follow her out of the kitchen and into the shop proper; feline ears picked up the cheery sounds of Tom getting an order ready for a customer, as well as the low murmur from the morning rush. I wasn't surprised at all, for the tiny bakery truly was one of the best in the city. As I waited, I scanned the kitchen to ensure we'd erased all evidence of our nocturnal baking and smiled, satisfied that nothing was out of place.

Sabine returned with an oversized takeaway cup which my feline nose easily tagged as the flavorful blend _and_ a small package topped with a bakery bag that (per my nose) contained at least one Belgian Chocolate croissant. "Uh…" I said as she handed everything to me. "I—"

"It's hard not to spoil my daughter's cat," Sabine laughed.

"Sabine," I replied, tilting my head slightly and looking at her slyly, "you keep feeding me like this and I'll never stop coming back."

"That, young man, is kind of the point."

"You've been warned," I laughed before leaning down to give her a quick kiss. "Let me get my wallet—"

"Nonsense," Sabine waved me off as I tried to retrieve my baton and the emergency stash of Euros I kept inside. "On the house."

"Are you sure?"

"Absolutely," she nodded; she turned toward the shop as we both heard Tom calling. "Gotta go."

"Same," I said sadly. "Thanks."

It took a bit of doing, but I managed to get everything back to my office with nary a spilled drop of coffee; a few minutes before nine, Adrien Agreste became the hero of the administrative suite when I shared all but the croissant and coffee with my staff. Settling in behind my desk, I'd just managed to tear off a portion of said pastry when Tomas appeared, frowning. I tried not to swallow the amazing work of art whole, but he looked so upset it was hard not to. "What happened?" I asked.

Tomas hovered at the door. "I hesitate to bring this to you, Adrien, but the design staff are still waiting on the sketches from your father."

"For the Christmas collection? He was supposed to get that to them, what, before I went to Nice?"

Tomas nodded. "Yeah. I don't need to tell you the schedule…" he trailed off.

I groaned. Most people outside the industry had no idea how far in advance we worked; it was barely July but we were fully into our preparations for the largest sales period of the year, while beginning our preliminary Spring show work. My work before leaving for our vacation had catapulted the partnership pieces into demand, and though it was a start, those were not enough to fill the void of what we typically needed to offer over the holidays. "Damn," I groaned again. "And you've called his assistant?"

"Nathalie says he's already turned them in. And that he's too busy to figure out who misplaced them."

"Likely story," I sighed. "Okay," I continued as I stood. "Let me go rifle his office; hopefully they are there. I'd not like to have to put in an appearance at the mansion."

He nodded as I slid past him. "You have a meeting—" he started, pointing to his tablet.

"I think this takes precedence."

"Good point. I'll clear your morning."

"Thanks," I replied as I strode down the glass-walled hallway toward the corner suite that belonged to Father.

Unsurprisingly, there was no one at the assistant desk, nor did I find anyone inside his massive office when I slid the door open. Father spent as little time as possible at Corporate, preferring his sanctum at the mansion – something that hadn't changed in the years since Mother disappeared. The space was spartan, to put it mildly. Aside from the single desk in a corner, the walls were bare and there were only a few commercial works on fashion in his bookshelf. The view from the massive windows, though, was something else altogether; they looked down on a portion of the Seine that flowed past the building, and the Tower was visible in the distance. It was a shame no one could enjoy the space.

A quick search turned up absolutely nothing, and I frowned as I realized I would need to corner Father at the mansion. Pushing my way out of the office, I caught Tomas at the edge of mine. "Nothing," I said sadly. "I've got to go see him. Cancel the rest of my day, if you don't mind."

"Will it take _that_ long?"

"Hopefully not," I smiled grimly. "But I'll need the time to decompress."

* * *

_Note to readers:_

_One of my favorite aspects of writing fan fiction is the thoughtful feedback I receive from readers. I'm sure I'm not alone in posting new content and then breathlessly waiting to see what appears in the comments; even with stories such as _Roommates_, where I have carefully plotted out nearly everything, there will often been an observation that will have me scratch my chin and adjust the storyline ever-so-slightly. Unlike my novels, it's an organic process that I truly appreciate._

_So when what I thought was a clever (and long-planned) twist appeared in this chapter, the reaction wasn't what I expected. While I had intentionally made use of something from canon, the comments made me look at it more critically and, ultimately, decide to revisit the concept entirely. Unfortunately, pulling that loose thread has unwoven the next few chapters. Rather than make you wait for the rewrite, I am re-posting this chapter up to what is a natural break; hopefully by next week, I'll have dug myself out of this mess. _

_-ep_


	60. Accidental Discovery

**Sixty: Accidental Discovery**

_Author's Note: a clue to the whereabouts of the missing Miraculous box drops out of nowhere and into Chat Noir's paws._

* * *

"Seriously?"

I smiled at Marinette's small image on the Cat Phone. "Yeah. He's done this before; sometimes he gets so caught up in his work that he thinks he's done something when he's not."

"I hope for your sake it's a quick visit."

"Same," I replied from my perch on an antenna aerial a few blocks from the mansion.

"Did you call Nino—"

"No," I said quickly, flushing slightly that I'd actually used the excuse to visit my Father to get out of calling my best friend. "As soon as I get back, I'll set up dinner for four on our favorite rooftop."

"Okay," she smiled.

"You look tired," I observed.

"And your mask covers no better than my makeup," she laughed. "Let me know when you get done."

I nodded and blew her a kiss before snapping the baton closed and then leaping away; a few moments later, I emerged from the Metro stop in front of the mansion as Adrien, only slightly behind schedule from having signed a few autographs on the station platform. The mansion loomed in front of me, much as it always did, and for a few heartbeats I considered transforming and dashing away into something more pleasant.

Like a root canal, maybe.

Sighing, I crossed the avenue during a break in the traffic and then punched my code into the gate; the light flipped to green after a long enough pause I wondered if Father had finally removed me from the system. Slowly, the gates parted, and I walked down the drive, noting as I started up the steps that the sedan was missing.

_Figures_, I thought. _The one time I assume he'll be here, he's probably out_.

Fishing through my pockets, I came up with my key as I topped the final step, assuming correctly the door would be locked. Letting myself in, I paused at the threshold, surprised at how empty the atrium felt. More so without Nathalie's appearance to greet me, or, for that matter, my former bodyguard. The latter had retired nearly the same day I turned eighteen and moved into my dorm at college. A moment of nostalgia washed over me at the thought of that gruff exterior beneath which a warm, caring soul had resided; he'd been complicit on many, many Adrien escapes from the mansion and I'd never really been able to thank him enough for that. I'd hoped the pension I'd arranged for him soon after arriving at House of Gabriel had, in some small way, been a small move in that direction.

"Hello?" I called out as I shut the door behind me. "Father?"

My voice echoed in the space as I glanced toward the massive painting that still hung above the stairs leading to my old room. Technically it was _still_ my room, as Father had repeatedly reminded me when I announced I was moving out for college. I'd not seen the inside of it for some time, actually, and wondered if he had truly kept it exactly as I'd had it, just as he'd promised.

"Hello?" I called out, louder this time. "Nathalie? Anyone?"

Plagg poked his small head out from the special pocket I now had sewn into all of our garments. Officially they were known as the Smartphone Pocket, but it also happened to be the exact dimensions of one feline kwami. "This is rather warm and inviting, isn't it?" he said, his tiny voice dripping with his usual sarcasm.

"Just so," I replied softly before looking down to my constant companion. "You're getting bold in your old age. Or have you forgotten about the security system?"

Plagg rolled his tiny feline eyes at me. "No, but _someone_ seems to have forgotten that I can't be recorded."

I looked up at a random corner of the atrium, knowing somewhere in the heights was a hidden camera covering the entrance. Father was nothing if not consistent in his paranoia surrounding his safety. At one point I'd thought it was more to protect me, but that changed the day he'd turned the system against _me_ in a confrontation that had been seared into my brain permanently.

"That might come in handy yet," I replied softly as I casually pulled my shirt closed, pressing Plagg back into his pocket in the process. It was hard not to smile at his muttering.

I waited a moment and then headed for the atelier, wondering if Father was actually in but so engrossed in his work he'd failed to hear me. Considering how he had ignored me through the majority of my teenage years, it wasn't much of a stretch. Still, I paused again with my hand on the door, for the atelier had been forbidden territory growing up. The few times I'd been allowed inside had revolved around Father imparting another mandate, administering some sort of discipline, or the aforementioned Grimoire incident.

Of course, then there was the day I'd told him I was moving out.

The thought of his surprised expression when it became clear I wasn't going to bow to his desire to keep me close made me smile; it had been a long time coming, my carefully planned escape from the confines of the mansion. Turning the knob, I stepped into the darkened study and found it as disquietingly empty as the atrium. The space was pretty much as I'd seen it nearly a five years earlier, though it made me smile slightly that I'd successfully avoided the space for so long; it was sobering to think the last visit hadn't truly been entirely on my own terms.

But not that morning.

That morning, I was well within my rights as co-CEO in attempting to locate materials for our company; regardless of what he might think when he ultimately saw the video of me rifling through his sanctum (and he _would_ see it, I was certain of that), his own actions had made the atelier effectively an extension of our corporate office. Still, it was hard not to want to twist toward the hidden camera in that space with a devilish feline grin.

Channeling Chat, I continued to suppress a crafty cat smile as I closed the door behind me and started to search for the sketches. I didn't expect to find a hard copy of them, since that wasn't his style. An electronic version was more likely, but as I settled in behind Nathalie's desk, I knew that while my own tech skills were pretty good, Nathalie's were better. It was unlikely she had _password_ as her password.

Sighing, I sat back in the chair. "I don't suppose you know how to hack a computer?" I asked my kwami as I fruitlessly lifted the keyboard, searching for a sticky note that wasn't there.

"Not really my specialty," he said after a moment, his voice muffled in the fabric of my shirt. Before I could stop him, he floated out of his hiding spot and hovered above the keyboard. "But I have learned a few things in my millennia," he continued, his feline eyes narrowing as they focused on the side of the computer.

"Plagg," I said firmly, a note of warning in my voice. "Whatever you are thinking of doing, it had better not be something that will require me to call Ladybug so she can save my furry butt."

The small God of Destruction trained a withering glare on me.

"We have a track record, you and I," I reminded him. "I've not screwed up in a few months, either. It would be nice to continue that trend."

Plagg frowned. "You're not actually blaming _me_ for that molasses situation?" he asked.

"If the boot sticks-"

Folding his tiny paws, he narrowed his feline eyes at me. "I cannot be held responsible for actions you take while transformed."

"Oh?" I smiled. "After all these years together, are you _actually_ going to try and tell me you can't influence me while I'm wearing the mask and ears?"

Plagg looked away.

"That's what I thought," I laughed. "I'm glad we're clear on that," I added as I stood up. "But you've given me an idea all the same. Come on."

"Where are we going?" he asked as he zipped back into his hidden pocket.

"Upstairs," I said.

I rearranged Nathalie's desk just as I'd found it and slipped back out of the atelier. Ignoring the empty atrium, I trundled up the steps to my former bedroom, partially curious what I would find inside. Carefully pushing through the door, though, my jaw dropped. For my room was _exactly_ as I had left it nearly five years earlier, right down to the odd angle of the chair at my desk. Sniffing the air, even without my feline enhancements it smelled a bit stale, and though it was dust free through the efforts of the housekeeping service, it was clear that the space had not been used at all since my departure.

Pulling out the chair, I sat down at the amazingly clean desk and took a look at the computer. It was well out of date now, easily more than seven years old – a museum piece, given how quickly technology aged. Pressing the power button didn't get me anywhere other than a sad _bleep_ and quick flash on one of the monitors. "Well, so much for _that_ idea," I sighed as I sat back and slowly twirled in my chair.

My kwami floated out of his pocket again and paused in front of the dead CPU. Cocking his tiny feline head at the smooth surface, he smiled. "It just needs a good jump start," Plagg said.

"What good will that do?" I rolled my eyes. "I need to get into the computer, not destroy it."

Plagg floated up to me. "You've done something like that before," he said more patiently than he normally would.

"I have?" I replied, before the penny dropped. "Wait, that was on a bus. And it didn't exactly work out as planned."

"You have a more control over Cataclysm now," he reminded me. "A little dab goes a long way."

I looked at my impish kwami and wondered, trying to balance the possibility of finding what I needed with having Chat Noir discovered trying to break in. Then again, I'd not anticipated being in the mansion alone and I needed the sketches. Though it went against my better judgement, I bowed to Plagg's influence. "Plagg – claws out!"

The flash of transformation lit the room for a moment before I saw my claw-tipped paws. Trusting in Plagg, I positioned my ring paw to the side of the workstation, held my breath, and uttered the magic phrase: "Cataclysm!"

Expecting the computer to turn to dust, I was pleasantly surprised to see the lights burst to life and heard the internal fan begin to whir. A moment later, the main screen lit up and displayed the login prompt I'd not used in years. It was slow – far slower than the MacBook I used for work – but seeing it back in action made me smile.

"Well now," I laughed. "Guess you can teach an old Chat new tricks."

It took me a moment to remember the password I'd used more than five years earlier, and as my claw tips tapped along on the keyboard, much like the main gate out front, I wondered if Father had erased my account on the mansion's servers. When my old desktop popped up, complete with my Ladybug wallpaper, I started to re-evaluate just how much of a box he had put his son into.

_It's like he's expecting me to return at any time,_ I thought, and the idea brought an unexpected wave of pity for my Father. _That's never going to happen. But I don't know how I'll ever get that across to him_.

Pausing for a moment, I twisted around in the chair again and used my full complement of feline senses to take in my room. I sighed, for the space was a vision of the son I had been, at least in my father's view: carefully controlled, closely monitored and relentlessly protected. As I turned back to the computer, I couldn't help the Chat smile, for Father had no clue just how footloose and fancy free I had been once granted the honor of being Chat Noir. Most evenings had been spent outside this gilded cage, many with Marinette at the Bakery learning how to be person who I was truly meant to be.

Knowing it would be nearly impossible for me to access Nathalie's personal files, my only hope was that she had stored Father's designs on the main file shares of the internal network. Fortunately, her relentless quest to organize his life worked in my favor, for in short order I located a set of folders that looked promising. Carefully I tapped away at the keyboard with my claws, searching the folders; it took maybe five minutes to find the designs for Christmas, and one more to email them to my team back at the office. The theft was reasonably quick, and I congratulated myself for my black cat stealth.

A few moments more and I powered down the workstation, watching the light blink out for what might likely be the last time. Staring at my masked reflection in the large monitor, I smiled slightly, wondering how my potential transgression would play with Father.

For once, I found I didn't truly care.

As tempted as I was to remain transformed and fling myself out of my bedroom window just for old time's sake, I bowed to the need for the security system to see Adrien exit, well aware that Father (or Nathalie) would be following up with why I had felt the need to roam the empty mansion. Twirling in the chair one last time, I took in my room with my masked feline eyes with a bit of melancholy, and then dropped my transformation.

Once I was outside the gate, I casually walked a few blocks to an alleyway I'd not used in a while and called for my transformation; moments after the green flash had washed over me, I was clawing my way up the side of a building, my movements protected by the shadows. As I pulled myself onto a slanted tile roof, tail snapping behind me, I realized the visit to the mansion had gone far better than I'd anticipated; I'd cleared my day for nothing, and yet felt no compunction about stretching out in the warm sunshine and ignoring being a responsible adult-slash-CEO for a bit longer.

One of the worst side effects of being Chat was the rather insatiable curiosity I experienced while transformed. I mean, as Adrien, I had always been intellectually curious about the world around me, though I'd tended to hide it beneath the quintessential stereotypical blonde act I'd done to further separate my alter-ego from Chat during my younger years. The irony, of course, had been reflected in the thousands of comments on the Ladyblog righty pointing out how quickly Chat tended to rush into danger; little did my fans know it had always been a (mostly) well calculated risk to protect Ladybug or give her the added time she often needed to perfect her Lucky Charm.

Having spare time on my hands tended to exacerbate the impulse for wanting to tie up loose ends, so it wasn't entirely my fault that as I semi-dozed in the morning sunlight, my thoughts turned to the still as-yet-undiscovered Miracle Box we thought Manon had stumbled upon. Having just been at the mansion, I thought again of the hidden safe behind the painting in the atelier and the Miraculous Grimoire within it. For the moment, it seemed safe enough, but it struck me as funny how something so powerful could hide in plain sight. Much like my ring in Chameleon Mode, I supposed.

_Hiding in plain sight,_ I thought. _That's what every Miraculous does, isn't it? Even the Box that Master Fu has blends into his surroundings._

Cracking open a masked eye, I stared for a moment at the glowing paw print on my ring, and wondered: had we seen Manon's box and not recognized it for what it was? Ladybug and I had turned over most of the places we'd known she'd been, including what we thought had been her base of operations at the warehouse where we'd had our final showdown. Had we missed a spot?

In flash, I saw in my memory the abandoned Metro platform I'd followed Alya to the fateful day that had explained why she'd been acting so strangely. I'd doubled back to that platform a few times during our extensive searches earlier in the spring but hadn't discovered any clues at all. Smacking my paw to my masked face, though, I realized that while I'd upended every piece of debris in the space, I'd completely overlooked the elevator Manon had descended on. We'd made the cardinal sin of assuming we'd found her secret lair, and therefore had never thought to investigate further.

As I was already transformed and now had the balance of a day free, it was almost like the decision had been made for me. Stretching luxuriously, I was a little sad to give up prime nap real estate but nonetheless flipped into my crouch so I could snag my baton and start to work my way toward the station. Nearly at the same moment, it cheerfully chirped at me, and I smiled when I snapped it open to phone mode only to see Ladybug's beautiful face on the small screen.

"Milady," I smiled. "Are you playing hooky?"

"Maybe," she laughed. "I took an early lunch and a chance you were transformed." Ladybug looked at me with a knowing grin. "Can I tempt my fiancé with some fresh onion soup in a bread bowl? I figured it might sooth your tortured soul after meeting with your father."

"You know how to make a kitty feel loved," I purred, "but despite it going far better than I thought it would – and it pains me to say this - I might have to take a raincheck."

"You're _passing_ on onion soup? Who are you and what have you done with Chat?" Ladybug's expression turned quizzical. "Wait, I've seen that look before."

"What look?"

"The one where you're tracking prey," she smiled slightly. "You're on the hunt, aren't you?"

"Guilty as charged," I said sheepishly.

"What caught your attention?" she asked.

"I've been thinking about the missing Miracle Box and realized there was one place we've not thoroughly searched."

"Really?" Ladybug looked thoughtful. "Where?"

I smiled a bit. "I don't know, _exactly_. I think it might be worth starting again with that abandoned Metro station, though. As you can probably surmise, not knowing bugs me. Since I cleared my schedule to deal with Father, I have time for a little feline investigation."

"Once a cat, always a cat," she nodded, eyes still thoughtful. "I do wonder if you could be on to something."

"We can't be that lucky," I said, masked eyes narrowing. "Can we?"

"You forget who your partner is," she laughed. "Let me clear _my_ afternoon, and then I'll meet you there."


	61. Confirmation

**Sixty-One: Confirmation**

_Author's Note: Following up on his hunch, Chat and Ladybug discover the source of Manon's transformation earlier in the year._

* * *

The day's brilliant sunshine that had so recently seen me inclined toward lazily napping on a comfortable rooftop had, to my surprise, given way to dark clouds building over the city as I worked my way toward the station where Alya worked and the Metro station opposite. While I was normally a connoisseur of the newspaper, my sleepless night with Marinette had left me with little time to scan more than the headlines on my way out the window for work; as it was perfectly logical thunderstorms had been in the forecast, I still couldn't help but feel they were an awful portend of what was yet to come.

Vaulting up into the slowly increasing gusts of wind to cross an alleyway, the scent of faraway rain hit my feline nose and I grimaced. My costume was, of course, water repellant, but yet another feline trait that had become more pronounced as I grew older was the decided distaste for being soggy while transformed. I frowned further as my feline sense of hearing picked up the subtle change in sounds as a result of the dropping air pressure; unless I took cover and waited it out, I'd likely be wringing my wild mane within the hour.

Landing in a crouch (and, maybe, just a bit of a classic dab pose), I looked up as I caught the sound of my approaching partner on the wind. Staying in my cat stance, my masked eyes quickly picked out her colorful form against the gathering overcast. Mere moments after that, she smoothly landed beside me with the grace of a ballerina and smiled at me as she wound her yo-yo.

"If we didn't have pawressing business, I'd take time to fly a kite," I smiled.

"Any other day," Ladybug mused as she knelt down to scratch behind an ear. "Good kitty," she teased as I involuntarily leaned into her touch and started to purr.

"Whatever you want," I managed to say, "I'll do it."

"I know," she laughed as she leaned down further to kiss me.

A gust of wind whipped my mane around a bit as I stood and then did my traditional bow-and-a-kiss on her knuckles, despite having already procured something better from her lips. "We may want to hurry slightly, Milady," I said as we started walking toward the edge of the rooftop we were on. "This storm isn't going to wait for us."

"Where did it come from?" she asked as we leapt, side-by-side, over an alleyway and fell into an easy rhythm running together along the spine of the next building. "I admit I wasn't paying attention to the news today."

"That makes two of us," I said as I sniffed the air again. "It's a strong one. Not entirely surprising given the time of year, but it's building fast."

"With luck we'll be inside when the worst hits," she replied. "Speaking of – where _are_ we going, exactly? We've turned over everything in that station at least once. You aren't thinking of searching it again, are you?"

I shook my mane as I leapt up and pogo-vaulted over a wider road, landing beside Ladybug on the far side with practiced ease. "Maybe last," I said. "But I think whatever we want – while hiding in plain sight – will be wherever that elevator took Manon to."

Pausing long enough to take my bearings, I smiled a bit wider. "I took a look at the city map again. It's not terribly easy to triangulate where that mystery abandoned station is – it's not on any transportation schematic of Paris I could access from the baton – but using a bit of feline intuition, I think _that_—" I nodded at a stately multi-storied building from another time that had nonetheless aged fairly gracefully, "—is what we are looking for."

Ladybug followed my gaze, though it took visible effort for her to brace against the freshening gale. "That looks like a more majestic version of Le Grande Hotel Paris," she said, raising her voice against the wind.

"It used to be," I nodded. "From what I could see online, an enterprising developer converted the upper portion to single-family apartments in the late eighties, with dining and retail at the street level." I smiled slightly. "Oddly, the facts fit – it would have been quite the marketing point to be a hotel with direct access to the Metro. I suspect the station was closed after it went completely residential."

Ladybug nodded thoughtfully. "Now I understand why the station was so ornate," she mused. Her observation reminded me of the grand architecture of the now disused platform far below us. "Where do you want to start?"

I used the baton to point to a peaked structure on the roof. "Top down?" I replied. "And that is about as far as I've thought this out. I have zero idea what the box will be masquerading as."

My partner looked the building up and down again. "That is a lot of space to cover, too."

"Yeah," I sighed. "I guess I didn't really think through this all the way."

"No," Ladybug said, raising her voice again against the much louder wind. "You got us further than ever – looking in a new spot is nothing to sneeze at."

"Still," I sighed deeper. "We could probably use a bit of your luck. I really don't want to have to go room by room in that thing. Can you imagine what the neighbors would say to each other?"

"I can…" Ladybug trailed off, and I could see her eyes had gone distant.

Arching an eyebrow, I simply waited, for I was well aware what that look meant.

After a few moments, her gaze snapped back to me and her smile went wider. "Luck," she nodded again. "That might just be the answer, Chat. You are two for two today."

"I… am?"

"Yes," she replied. "Let's get to that rooftop and I'll show you."

In just the few short minutes we'd been chatting, the wind had grown fierce and darkness had begun to envelope the city. Streetlights far below us burst into life, and umbrellas began to appear as the first drops of rain pelted the pedestrians. Soaring across the avenue to the former hotel felt like I was diving headlong into a hailstorm; water was dripping off of my mask as I did a perfunctory two-foot landing beside what appeared to have once been a rooftop garden. Very little green was left other than the random diehard weed, but a winding flagstone pathway bespoke of a better time.

Bent against the wind, I followed Ladybug to the structure I'd pointed out. To my surprise, it wasn't simply the entrance to a rooftop stairwell, but was, in fact, some sort of penthouse suite. Turning, I realized the garden was actually the _backyard_ of the suite, as if a single-family home had somehow been hoisted to the roof of the building. As with the rest of the exterior of the building, the penthouse had seen better days; the slider to the garden was missing it's requisite pane of glass, making a potential ingress into the space fairly straightforward.

"Convenient," I murmured, still somewhat on edge without truly knowing _why_. In my early days as Chat Noir, I would have ignored the tiny warnings in the back of my feline head; I'd learned the wisdom of trusting my instincts – and those of Ladybug's – and turned toward her. "What do you think?"

Snapping open her yo-yo, she activated her flashlight function and held it high, sweeping the now darkened space slowly. "I don't know about you, but this is giving me goosebumps. And that is saying something, given that we're standing in the rain."

I nodded, trying to shake the same feeling and a few ounces of water from my now-soggy mane.

Carefully, Ladybug eased her way through the broken glass, and I quickly followed, the residue crunching beneath my boots. Instinctively, I moved to put her behind me as I deferred to my non-night vision partner and activated the light on the baton. Bathing the area in our twin beams of soft light revealed a two-tiered space; possibly a living room, a sunken area in the center had a small circular spot that might have been a fire pit or a fountain in a past life. The top of what might have once been a grand stairwell was visible at the far end, as was a set of metallic elevator doors that sparkled as our beams passed over it.

The space was large, far larger on the inside than I'd expected. Wallpaper was peeling from the edges around the ceiling, and the wall sconces evoked the lighting we'd seen in the Metro station. Slowly, I started to nod. "I think this was part of the original hotel," I said, my voice echoing in the space slightly. The wind was whistling through the gap in the door, creating a high-pitched wail that added to the creepiness factor. "It's similar to what Chloe had at Le Grand."

Flicking her light at the elevator, Ladybug also nodded. "With its own dedicated elevator? That would fit for a high roller." She looked back to me. "Or the owner, maybe?"

"Yeah. What an odd place for Manon to have stumbled upon," I murmured. "The warehouse I get – it's on the far side of the city, isolated. But here?"

"You forget what we're close to," Ladybug reminded me as she tugged at my arm. "Look."

Staring through the grimy window she'd pulled me to, I could see the penthouse had a direct line of sight to the building where Alya worked, as well as the Metro station opposite; while it was still a few blocks away, with suitable binoculars, it would make an excellent observation post. "This was well planned," I mused, the fur on the back of my neck suddenly standing straight up. "Why does that worry me?"

We turned and worked our way around the edge of the sunken center and paused against the once-gilded banister of the stairwell; my feline eyes pierced the darkness and saw it turned at a landing six steps down, and appeared to exit into some sort of foyer. Turning back to Ladybug, I could see she'd gone thoughtful again.

"This is a lot of effort for a teenager," she said softly. "Manon is many things, believe me, but doesn't feel like the kind of kid that would go to this level to, what, exactly?"

I thought for a moment. "It was revenge of a sense, right?" I said, recalling what Manon had told us in those final moments at the warehouse. "Getting back at us for keeping her mother preoccupied with the exploits of the Heroes of Paris."

"Yeah," she nodded slowly. "Still, that she would be tracking Alya so closely… just to unmask us? Alya was already doing a fair job of that _before_ Manon came into the picture." Ladybug looked away. "Reading the Ladyblog itself would likely have given her far more information about us than following Alya all over the city."

"It was more to ruin our reputation," I reminded her. "You saw her – she was blinded enough by her rage to forcibly merge two Miraculous incorrectly."

"True," she said after a moment. "Still… I feel like we're missing something."

"Story of my life," I smiled as I gently reached out and cupped her face with my paw. "At least, until you became a part of it."

Ladybug smiled. "You old softie," she whispered before she gave me a quick peck on the cheek. As she started to pull away, a massive clap of thunder rolled over the building, then another; brief, brilliant flashes of lightening helped punctuate the wrath overhead. "Let's see if our treasure chest is really here; then we can go somewhere cozy to ride out this storm."

"I have a few ideas on that front," I quipped, waggling my masked eyebrows as my tail snaked around her thigh.

"One track mind," Ladybug smirked as she pulled out her yo-yo and deftly slipped from the grasp of my tail.

"With a girlfriend as hot—"

"Stand back," Ladybug chuckled, interrupting me.

Sadly, I stepped back a bit more and watched as she called on her Lucky Charm; the room was lit briefly by the glow from her red helpers, and as it faded, a small box with a classically-shaped lightbulb dropped into her hands. Looking down on it, I initially frowned at the simple looking rectangular box before seeing it had a single red button. "I feel like you're pressing your luck," I said as I looked to her. "What on Earth did you get?"

"It was your idea, really," she smiled as she pressed the button. The lightbulb glowed to life, and a cheery _chirp-chirp-chirp_ issued from an unseen speaker.

"My idea?"

"Yes, silly kitty," she replied as she slowly turned with the device, pausing when the light grew slightly brighter and the _chirp-chirp-chirp_ noise picked up in speed. "If I recall correctly, you suggested we would need a bit of luck to find the box."

My masked eyes shot to the small device. "You're using luck… literally… to find the missing box?"

"Yep," she smiled wider. "Not bad, eh?"

"That… that is a new one," I replied as we started down the staircase. "I had no idea your Charms could be so literal."

"Me either," Ladybug said, "which makes me wonder if I'm starting to change, too."

I abruptly stopped on the landing. "Maybe you'll be able to have as fine-grained control over your secret power as I seem to have now," I said slowly. "Holy kwami. That opens an entire can of sardines."

"Isn't the expression 'can of worms?'" she asked as we continued.

I grimaced. "Maybe for non-felines. Who wants to eat _worms_?"

I didn't need her to turn around to know she was rolling her eyes.

The small foyer at the bottom filled in more of the footprint of the penthouse, for the main door was at one end; a hallway stretched away from us, with doors at a few points. Ladybug continued down the hallway, following the growing glow from the bulb and the more insistent chirping; at a closed oak double door at the end, the lightbulb was so bright, I had to hold a paw up to shield my masked eyes. "Here?" I asked unnecessarily.

"I think so."

Pressing the button to deactivate the small device, she slipped it under her yo-yo and then slid the door open. The space beyond appeared to have been a library of sorts, with three walls of empty bookshelves facing tall windows looking out across the city. Sheets of rain washed across the beveled glass as buildings in the distance were repeatedly brought into focus with bursts of light from the storm; the same increasingly frequent illumination caught a small, nondescript suitcase sitting off to the side of the room.

My ears flattened as the unusual odor hit my feline nose; whatever it was, the notes of frankincense, myrrh and maybe a touch of jasmine bespoke of antiquity, and the inherent mythical danger that often accompanied it. Unbidden, a low growl bubbled up from me as I placed myself firmly in front of Ladybug.

"Chat?"

"I think we've found it," I said, though it was a moment before I realized I'd tensed into my crouch, baton swirling in one paw. "It is very old. And very powerful. And it smells nothing like the one Master Fu has."

Looking for all the world as though it were something a tourist had forgotten after their holiday, it was hard to reconcile the nearly physical waves of danger radiating away from it. Creeping closer, with Ladybug close behind, I could see it seemed in every way to be a very ordinary piece of luggage, though as I examined it further, it blended with what I assumed had been the original style of the building. Almost an Art Deco, mid nineteen-twenties vibe, straight from the era when all things Egyptian were in vogue.

I nodded slowly. "This belonged to the owner of the hotel," I said as I knelt beside it. The detail on the suitcase was amazing. Looking back at Ladybug, I frowned. "I don't exactly know _how_ I know. But I think it managed to remain hidden here – in this space – until Manon somehow found it." I sniffed again. "I can pick up some residual scent of Manon, but that's it, Milady."

"Who overlooks a suitcase in an empty penthouse?" Ladybug asked, somewhat skeptical.

I shrugged. "Maybe the box didn't _want_ to be found. Not until recently."

"Is that even possible?"

"There's so little we actually know about the Miraculous," I sighed. "Maybe we can get something out of Plagg and Tikki tonight. Or Master Fu." My masked feline eyes went to the latch. "Do we open it?"

"I'm sure it's not that easy," she replied as she slid around me and drew out her device once more, using the brilliant light to confirm what we thought. "Well," she said just as her earrings began to chirp on their own. "Even if I knew _how_ to open this, I wouldn't want to do it without Master Fu. If we're right, though, there could be some very lonely kwamis stuck inside that will be extremely happy to get out."

"I'm worried about moving it," I said, unable to shake the sense that this Miracle Box was unlike anything we'd encountered before, even Master Fu's. "But if there is even a chance that Hawkmoth _has_ or_ could_ find it, we need to relocate it."

"Agreed," she said as she snapped open her yo-yo. "Let me tell the Guardian we are on our way; I'll recharge and then we'll use the cover of this storm to get it to him."

"Excellent plan," I said, though something about the box still set my teeth on edge. "Although to be honest, Milady, I'd rather put a few hundred thousand kilometers between this and Paris."

Ladybug nodded as she dialed. "Oddly, I couldn't agree with you more…"


	62. Who's On First

**Sixty-Two: Who's on First?**

_Author's Note: As Master Fu begins to unlock the secrets of the newly discovered Miraculous Box, Chat and Ladybug return to more mundane matters… such as dealing with the superhero marriage proposal from Rena…_

* * *

"You have rather amazingly managed to avoid calling Nino."

The two of us were in a favorite position on the couch: I was lounging on my back, head in Marinette's lap, eyes closed and purring as she gently ran tiny circles around the edges of my feline ears. Still keeping to our normal appearances, I'd come in through the balcony after a long morning of meetings at House of Gabriel and an even longer afternoon and late evening shooting spreads for the Christmas catalogue wanting nothing more than a long, hot shower and a glass of wine. I should have therefore been suspicious when my feline nose picked up the tantalizing scent of braised short ribs co-mingled with freshly baked bread.

Following my feline nose led me to my fiancé, lounging on our couch in her rather form-fitting jogging apparel and wearing her _come hither, kitty_ smile. All thoughts of anything other than curling up against her lithe form disappeared, and I'd quickly snuggled into her after silently apologizing to Plagg for keeping him cooped up a bit longer.

Her true motives revealed, though, I cracked open a masked eye and looked at her accusingly, or, at least as accusingly as an overgrown feline could when reduced to putty in her hands. "I've been busy," I halfheartedly explained.

"It's been two _weeks_," Marinette said as she shifted to the other ear. "I can't move into the next part of our plan until you speak with Nino. And if you put it off much more, Alya's not going to be in any shape to have a wedding."

She was right, for my tail dragging had crested Alya into her fifth month; she'd officially told Ladybug that she was going to put up her Miraculous for the remainder of her pregnancy, short of the wedding, which had yet to be scheduled. I sighed, for while I desperately wanted to please my partner, part of me was concerned with what she had concocted. "You still think this will work?"

"Yes," Marinette said without hesitation.

"Mari," I said as I twisted around to face her, sad that it also meant she stopped focusing on my ears. "These are our _friends_. I don't want them to be hurt."

"Trust me," Marinette said as she moved in to kiss the tiny spot of my nose not covered by the mask.

"That was never in question," I replied as I moved in closer and nibbled at her lip, and then slowly started to work my way down her chin to a favorite spot at the base of her neck. It had the benefit of preventing an immediate response, and based on the slight increase in her heartrate, I knew I was close to distracting her completely from the topic at hand.

Recognizing my tactics, however, Marinette gently pushed me away, albeit reluctantly. "Nice try, kitty," she laughed. "I'll not be sidetracked, though. Not yet." She looked at me slyly. "Make the call and I'll make it worth your while."

Easily flipping up and perching atop the couch, I angled my wild mane toward at her, my tail twisting as I arched a masked eyebrow. "Are you insinuating what I think you are?"

"Let's just say, I think you might need some extra motivation."

My masked eyes flew wide, but other parts of me indicated they understood her position. One swift move and I had the baton in my paw snapped open to phone mode. "Milady, you play dirty," I said, matching her sly smile with one of my own. "One could even say this is cruel and unusual punishment."

"Says the incredibly hot guy wearing a form-fitting costume leaving nothing to the imagination perched barely a meter from me," she smiled slightly. "Did I mention how amazingly attractive I find you in black spandex? I'm not sure which of us has the worst part of this deal."

"It's not spandex," I reminded her as I started to dial Carapace/Nino.

"I'll be the judge of that," she smiled. "Now hurry up and dial, damn it."

* * *

Reluctantly, I left the apartment – and the tender embrace of Marinette – to meet up with Carapace close to the witching hour. The warm afterglow of the evening followed me out the balcony window, though I was somewhat sad that the short ribs had been, by necessity, ignored. Marinette promised me they would continue to hold on low in the oven until I returned; I slyly informed her I might have other priorities based on how the night had begun.

Paris had seen more than its fair share of rain since our discovery of the second Miracle Box, and as I clawed up the side of our apartment building to begin my journey toward my turtle rendezvous, the overcast sky blocked out what little light the crescent moon might have provided. The scent of rain was heavy in the air, too, though based on the relative strength of the smell, not in the immediate future. Lights from the city underlit the clouds, giving the sky an unusual reverse glow that was best enjoyed from the very rooftops I was running across.

I could see Carapace was already sitting on the edge of a more egregious example of modern architecture when I landed on a nearby lamp; using it as a springboard, I vaulted upward and twisted into an impressive mid-air roll that looped just enough for me to snag the edge of the overhang he was beneath. Smoothly dropping into a seated position next to him, I could already see him rolling his eyes behind his goggles.

"Seriously?"

"What?" I replied nonchalantly as I slid the baton to the small of my back.

"That was a little over the top, especially since no one is around to see your antics."

I smiled wider. "_You_ were watching."

"Still."

I laughed a bit. "It's part of my persona," I shrugged. "Anyway, thanks for sneaking away from Rena for a bit."

"Technically I'm looking for peanut butter and sardines," my friend said, barely suppressing a shudder.

My masked eyes widened. "Not… _please_ tell me she's not…"

"Together, yes." This time, he did shudder. "Just about everything else I've managed to roll with, but some of the food cravings… I swear, I think half the time she's just trying to get me out to the apartment for a few hours."

I nodded. "She could be," I said sagely, though in truth I had zero experience in that area save for what I'd seen in the movies. "It's solid training, though."

That made Carapace smile. "I was already well trained, dude."

"Never hurts to have a refresher course in where your place is."

"Truth, that," he chuckled as we fist pumped in solidarity. "So," he asked after a moment, "what did you want to chat about? You were pretty vague on the call."

"Yeah," I replied, my tail swishing, traitorously belying my anxiety.

"Uh oh," Carapace said, his eyes shifting to said tail. "This can't be good."

Grinning sheepishly, I held up my paws. "I'm a lousy messenger," I started. "It's really Ladybug that's sent me on a fool's errand, if you ask my opinion."

"Oh?"

"Look, she's had an idea about the superhero wedding Rena wants," I continued, pulling in a few of my acting skills as a model. I felt a smidge guilty for working some magic on my best friend, but it was for the greater good. "As you can imagine, it's kind of like her Lucky Charms…"

Cap's eyes bugged out, for he'd been on the team long enough now to know that very few were straightforward. Little did he realize… "What on earth is she wanting to do?"

I sighed dramatically. "Well, first off she has to break up with me."

"_What?_"

"It's not quite what you think," I said, laughing. "I mean, that's one possibility. See, Ladybug isn't dating Chat, Marinette is. So, Marinette would have to publicly dump me, and then Ladybug could start to date me." I paused, dramatically. "Publicly."

Carapace blinked once, then twice. "Dude, aren't you _living_ with her?"

"As _Chat_, living with _Marinette_," I emphasized with deadly earnestness, trying hard not to laugh at the circular argument I was making.

"But—isn't that the same thing as living with _Ladybug_…?"

"Oh no," I said seriously. "Honestly, no one in our building knows I'm there. For all they know, she's living alone."

"Who knows?" he said, a look of confusion on his face.

"Absolutely," I nodded. "It's nuts, right?"

"It is? What is?"

"Then we have the problem of Adrien having been seen out with Ladybug, too," I continued. "He'd have to break up with Ladybug – or, I suppose, she'd have to break up with _him_, based on the photos Alya took—"

"Adrien is dating Ladybug?" Carapace asked, somewhat bewildered. "I mean, I suppose he is—"

"But he can't be seen in the apartment with Marinette, see, since she's dating Chat."

"What, he's not dating Marinette-"

I looked affronted. "Of course I am! Where have you been all this time?"

"You just said – no, not _you —_wait, I mean not you _you_, Adrien-"

"Adrien? Who's he dating?" I asked, before I let my ears go straight up. "Not _Chat_?! Man, I didn't see that coming…"

"Wait, dude," Carapace was starting to look desperate. "_You're_ Chat."

"Of course I am," I smiled. "And have been for a while."

"You're not dating yourself, then." He paused, confusion crossing his face. "Right?"

"No, silly," I laughed. "I'm dating Marinette."

"That's what I'm saying," Carapace said, voice rising slightly.

"No need to get jealous," I said pleasantly. "I mean, Marinette likes you, too, but she fell for me."

"I'm not jealous!" Carapace practically yelled.

"Hey-hey-hey," I cried, holding out my paws. "You can't blame her for loving a handsome tomcat like me."

"I'm not – I just—wait, what are we talking about exactly?"

"How crazy an idea it would be to do a superhero wedding," I said softly, going in for the kill.

Cap looked at me, mouth half-open, before the light of dawning recognition appeared in his eyes. "Dude," he said after a moment, "you could have just said that in the first place."

"I _told_ you it was a complicated plan," I reminded him. "And though I didn't initially think it would work, I can see now how beautifully it captures how mad the concept was to begin with."

My friend of years stared at me for a longer moment before a slight smile appeared, tinged with a bit of sadness. "While I don't disagree, Alya—uh, Rena that is—has her heart set on it, Chat. I don't want to disappoint her."

"That's good, for I've been authorized to offer a counter-proposal."

Cap rolled his eyes. "Of course you have."

"As it happens, we know someone who can perform an ancient bonding ritual for Miraculous Holders," I started. "It has to take place on a full moon, which I might note is in just ten days. If you and Rena would care to join Ladybug and I at this location—" I pulled out my baton and punched up the map function before twisting the display toward him, "—we will perform said ceremony for you and Rena."

Carapace's eyes widened behind the goggles. "There? Really?"

"Why not?" I smiled. "It has the benefit of being private, anyway, since we truly don't want anyone outside of our inner circle to know what we're doing."

"All right," Cap replied. "So she gets her superhero wedding, just not in public."

"Exactly," I replied. "Then your public wedding with all the trimmings can still take place."

"Ladybug agreed to do a dual wedding, though, Chat."

"She did," I nodded. "Ladybug and Chat will be 'bonded' at the same ceremony with you and Rena."

Carapace arched an eyebrow above his goggles. "I don't think that's _exactly_ what Rena had in mind."

"Probably not. Look," I said as I put a paw to his costumed shoulder. "If life were ordinary, we'd jump at the chance to have a wedding with our best friends. Frankly, I'm the one that's screwed this up; my dating her as Chat requires much more thought to unwind before my alter-ego can appear in her life. Rushing it would draw more attention that we can afford."

"It's not your fault," Carapace said softly. "If anything, Rena—"

"No," I said firmly, cutting off his sentence. "Her actions were not her own, Cap, and besides, they only made more visible what most of Paris already knew. Which is our problem to deal with, not yours." I smiled. "And before you say it, there is no way we will allow you to postpone your happiness in order for us to get our own act together."

"She's still not going to like this," Carapace sighed. "But I think she'll understand." He looked at me. "Clever coming to me and not her, though."

"Back channel negotiations are always more successful," I smiled.

"I still want you as my best man, dude," Carapace said. "At both weddings."

"And you at mine," I said happily. "As long as you don't mind Adrien being at the 'real' one."

He fist pumped me. "Not in the least. I gotta run," he added as he flipped into a stand; for some reason, I'd not noticed how his body had similarly adjusted to the nightly grind of being a hero and smiled a private smile. If my costume drove Marinette wild, it stood to reason…

"Good luck on the peanut butter and sardines thing," I grimaced again as I followed suit.

"I think I'm going to pick up some air fresheners, too," he laughed as he hurled himself off the roof and into the night.

The trip back to our apartment was routine, as much as racing across the rooftops of Paris could be. Sliding through the open doors of my balcony, though, I was rather surprised to see the space lit by flickering candles and one Marinette leaning against my pillow reading something on her kindle. As I crouched at the edge of the door, she put down the kindle and slid off the bed.

"How did it go?"

"Better than I expected," I smiled as I stood and put my paws to her bare arms. "I didn't think that whole 'Who's on First' bit would work, but it did."

Marinette bopped me on the nose with a fingertip. "Don't ever doubt me, kitty," she smiled.

"Lesson learned," I said as I leaned down to kiss her; as my lips hit hers, I felt her hands slowly move down my sides until they were resting on my hips. I started to pull away only to have her pull me closer; not entirely unexpected, I followed her lead and redoubled my efforts, starting with those amazing lips and then slowly nibbling back down the side of her neck.

My baton bumping up against the slightly open door of the balcony brought me up short, though, and popped the bubble for a moment. Smiling slyly, I paused in my hyper-attention to her smooth skin and looked into those deep blue eyes. "Purrhaps we should relocate somewhere more comfortable," I said softly before darting over to nip at an earlobe.

Marinette shuddered slightly. "That… might be wise."

Kissing her again to seal the deal, a thought struck me and I leaned back again. "By the way, you said my tail was going to be involved in this plan."

"I did," she said, her eyes dancing with merriment.

"Uh, Princess," I said, unwisely ignoring the signs, "I hesitate to point this out, but it-ooof!"

Those clever hands of Marinette had been, I thought, harmlessly tracing little circles around my hips, but in one swift movement, she managed to snag both my tail _and_ loop it around me twice before cinching it tight as if I'd been a giant feline yo-yo. Before I could catch my breath, she'd yanked the end again, sending me into a twirl that knocked me off balance just enough to fall on top of her upon the now conveniently positioned bed.

One final tug and she pressed me against her before reaching her two hands up to gently pull my face toward her. Smiling widely at me, I realized she'd plotted that little move out to quite literally to the meter.

_Clever bug_.

"Satisfied?" she said as she looked up at me.

"Not yet," I growled as my paw gripped the sheet and pulled it over the top of us.


	63. Preparations

**Sixty-Three: Preparations**

_Author's Note: Out and about fulfilling the checklist for Alya's wedding, Adrien is also surreptitiously on the prowl for the purrfect early birthday gift for Marinette._

* * *

The candles looked as pleasantly worn down as I felt, lying against my pillow with one arm hugging Marinette to my bare chest, the other just mobile enough for me to toy with her long raven hair. Somewhere along the line (either pre- or post-detransformation, I couldn't be sure), she'd lost the elastic that had held it in the haphazard bun I'd seen upon my return from meeting Carapace. Now lustrous strands of black had fanned out and away from her face as she gently snored, her hand against my chest rising and falling with each breath I took.

Without my claws, I was reduced to just running my fingers through her silky trusses; it wasn't quite the same, but it would have to do. Sighing contently, I tried to imagine what my life would be like without my princess being in it and came up with an emptiness so profound it hit me with enough of an emotional punch I caught myself gasping slightly. I decided to banish that particular line of thought to the furthest reaches of my feline brain, never to be accessed again.

Shifting slightly, Marinette stirred then snuggled in a bit closer. Her finger had been playfully toying with what little chest hair had grown back after my last photo shoot. To my surprise, she'd found the light blonde fuzz rather attractive, but had teased me unmercifully about having to perform, as she put it, "ground maintenance" come Monday morning for the next round of ads we were shooting that afternoon. She was well aware it was one of my least favorite aspects of the job – right up there with the makeup I was often forced to wear – and yet continued to get some insane pleasure out of what I had to go through, even going so far as to declare it was "about time for _someone_ to understand what went into adhering to society's vision of beauty."

She had a point, of course.

Flicking my eyes to the iPhone on the nightstand, the empty box of condoms beside it had me sighing ruefully, for it served as a reminder there would be no further kitty carousing until after I made my shopping rounds that morning. Partners now in all senses of the word, it took on a slightly more nuanced definition when it came to matters of romance. We each had our own part to play in that regard, though sometimes it was frustrating being a responsible feline; as I looked down at my beautiful fiancé, I knew it was the least I could do for her – or for _us_, since such matters were most definitely a group decision.

Glancing back to the iPhone, I realized it was close to dawn and I was no nearer to sleep than I had been when she'd met me at the balcony slider hours earlier. Happily, it _was_ the weekend, but sleeping in wasn't my style. Carefully, I slid out from beneath Marinette, gently placing her head upon my pillow before pulling the sheets over her bare skin. She sighed and shifted, but didn't stir; I smiled, wondering if I dared tease her about having worn her out and quickly deciding against it for reasons of self-preservation. Tiptoeing with as much stealth as was possible without being transformed, I nabbed a pair of sweats from the hamper and slid them on before slipping through the door to my suite and into the kitchen.

Evidence that Plagg had been there earlier – notably, a pile of crumpled aluminum wrappers for his favorite and insanely expensive Camembert – littered the breakfast bar, but it was a small price to pay for having kept him locked up in the ring for what had to have felt like multiple overtimes. While we'd come to an understanding, I'd still tended to feel guilty about being transformed for personal reasons.

Swiping the foil into a hand, I deposited the mess into the trash and then began to search for ingredients to make Marinette breakfast in bed. To my horror, though, I discovered we were out of just about everything, save for a half-empty box of stale corn flakes that I'd actually used as a coating on chicken breasts a month earlier. One quick look at the clock on the oven produced a Chat grin; there was at least one place I knew I could get to at that hour that would still allow me to take care of my princess.

"Plagg?" I called out quietly as I came out from behind the breakfast bar. "Are you awake?"

Scanning the living room as best as I could with non-night vision eyes, my kwami didn't appear to be about; I didn't bother to check my suite, since I knew he made a point of being as far away as possible when Marinette spent the night with me (unless, of course, I'd remained transformed); turning, my eyes fell upon a slightly-opened door to Marinette's suite, and I felt an eyebrow arch. "Plagg?" I called out again quietly as I tiptoed to the door. "Are you in there?"

Not getting a response, I paused for a moment before pushing the door open a bit further. Poking what I knew was an extremely tousled head through, I started to call out again. "Plagg-?"

A rustle from Marinette's bed attracted my attention, and what I saw stopped me in my tracks. A sliver of light from the streetlights below our apartment slipped through the crack in the curtains of the balcony door and fell upon the pillow, softly illuminating the tiny God of Destruction spooning with the God of Creation. Both were fast asleep, but it wasn't lost on me just how very comfortable they appeared to be with each other. My heart ached to think we'd kept them apart for as long as we had.

Carefully, I backed out of Marinette's room and returned to the kitchen, my plan temporarily foiled. Taking the Metro wasn't an option (Adrien's movements were tracked far too closely by the Parisian press as it was), so I went to the cabinet above the fridge and slid out the airtight canister I kept for emergencies. Holding my nose, I cracked open the top and waited.

In mere minutes, Plagg phased through the wall of the bedroom and zipped to a spot just in front of my face. "You must need something desperately to pull this out," he smiled as his luminescent eyes followed my movements carefully.

"I do," I said as I pulled out a small wheel of extremely odiferous cheese from the canister, followed by a second. "I hate to bother you, but I want to make breakfast for Marinette. Sadly, all we have in the apartment is your cheese."

"And what's wrong with that?" he asked, his eyes fixed on the wheel in my hand. He might have even been salivating.

"Unlike certain kwamis, my fiancé is not a huge fan of stinky cheese."

"She could learn to love it."

"I think not." I pushed the wheels toward him. "Not exactly the coin of the realm, but will this buy me a some time out and about this morning?"

Plagg's eyes flicked meaningfully toward the canister.

Sighing, I pulled out a third wheel. "You drive a hard bargain," I smiled as I slid it toward him.

"That one is for last night," he smiled in return. "When do you want to go?"

"Now, if I can."

Faster than I thought was possible, Plagg tore into the first wheel and demolished it completely. Laying on his back in the remains of the foil, his tiny tummy distended slightly, he belched once for effect before saying, "All right. Let's do this."

I softly called out for my transformation, and a few moments later I'd escaped the confines of our apartment. The sun was just beginning to peek out over the rooftops of the city as I accelerated into a run; the day smelled fresh and new to my feline nose, and I smiled a bit to think that, barring an interruption from our favorite supervillain, I might spend the balance of it with Marinette, curled up on the couch reading the paper together or watching one of my favorite classic movies. I'd recently picked up the original _Thomas Crown Affair_ and hadn't gotten to it yet; Nino – not normally a fan of the classics – had been the one to recommend it, especially a rather exotic game of chess between the two lead characters. It was such an atypical comment from him it had piqued my feline curiosity, something I was sure he'd intended all along.

The wondrous smell of baking bread alerted me I was close to my destination, and I tacked toward the Bakery; dropping to the rooftop patio, I pulled myself around the wrought iron railing and used the baton to lower myself to the kitchen door. It was actually already open, as Sabine was carting several large trash bags out to the dumpster in their alleyway. "Madame," I bowed in greeting as I stowed my baton. "May I offer a paw of assistance?" I asked before reaching in and grabbing the stack of broken-down cardboard just inside the door.

"Chat!" Sabine said cheerfully as I approached her. "You're out and about early."

Sliding the cardboard into a recycling slot, I turned my megawatt smile on her. "I'm hoping to surprise your daughter with some breakfast today, Madame."

"Are you, now," she smiled wider. "Well, as it happens, Tom has just made a fresh batch of cheese and broccoli quiche, and I think a loaf or two of sourdough just came out of the oven. Will that do?"

I took her hand in my paw and kissed the back of it gallantly. "You had me at 'cheese,'" I laughed.

One wicker basket brimming with mouth-watering goodies later, I was back over the rooftops of Paris, possibly running faster that I had on the way out. While I was purrfectly capable of making quiche myself these days, Tom's was something else entirely and normally sold out within minutes. Luck had been on my side for sure. I managed to slip back into our apartment undetected, though my fiancé's sixth sense for home cooking brought her out into the kitchen just as I was putting the finishing touches on the tray to take in to her.

"Is that what I think it is?" she asked through a yawn as she stretched her arms above her head. The oversized Chat Noir t-shirt hung below her knees, though my feline eyes were quick to note her sexy legs were still quite exposed.

"Yes," I smiled before pouting. "I was about to surprise you with this."

"I'm still surprised," she smiled as she slid onto the barstool. "What a wonderful way to wake up."

I poured her a cup of coffee from the carafe Tom had slipped in at the last moment before sliding the plate with a slice of quiche toward her. A smaller plate with a freshly buttered piece of sourdough arrived beside it, along with a smaller bowl full of berries Sabine had added. "Your parents say 'hi' by the way," I told her as I swiftly vaulted over the counter to perch on the barstool next to her.

"Let me guess…"

"Yeah," I smiled ruefully, "they invited us over to dinner. Tomorrow."

Marinette looked at me. "You said yes, didn't you?"

I knew I looked guilty. "How could I refuse? Your mom gave me a basket full of tasty delicacies and _then_ hit me up." The heat of my guilt told me my cheeks were flaming. "She told me there would be croquets. Your mother plays dirty."

"She knows your weaknesses," Marinette sighed.

My tail swished as I gave her my most doleful look.

"All right!" she laughed. "You clearly know _mine_. I suppose we can carve out time for a family dinner. Even if we were _just there last month_."

I leaned over and rubbed my face against her cheek, purring loudly. "Thanks, Princess."

"Don't thank me yet," she smiled slyly. "I intend to extract a heavy price for my assent."

My masked eyes flew wide as I pulled back. "What kind of price?" I asked, tail swishing with concern now.

Reaching up to my face, she gently gripped my chin and pulled me toward her. "The kind that will require you to stop at the pharmacy," she said softly before laying a smoldering reminder of what could be in my future upon my lips.

"Ah," I said as I pulled away, slightly dazed. "Then I'd better eat up and head out."

* * *

Much like my weekly run for expensive cheese for a certain kwami, I tended to shop in a district as far away from the apartment as possible in order to keep anyone from connecting Adrien Agreste to it. Someday, hopefully soon, that wouldn't be as necessary, but for that morning's shopping expedition, I chose a favorite set of shops in a specialty district halfway across Paris. Dropping into a secluded alley, I quickly transformed and allowed Plagg to get comfortable in his hiding spot before making the pharmacy my first visit; from there, I had several very specific items Marinette required for the superhero wedding and the pre- and post-festivities. Some were strangely ordinary, but one item – a bolt of brown spandex, and one of green – seemed to be for a sewing project I'd not been privy to.

By midday, I'd managed to round up all of what Marinette needed as well as some impressive cuts of pork that had called out to me from my favorite butcher; my cousin, Felix, had shared a recipe from his time in Stuttgart that included baking it in sauerkraut and serving with boiled potatoes that Marinette had actually liked, despite the rather terrible initial smell. I needed more time to brine the cabbage, but knew the pork would hold in the freezer for a bit. I'd been toying with a separate slow-cooker recipe for what Americans apparently called "barbeque pulled pork" that also sounded interesting, so either way, the cuts would get used.

Before heading back to my hidden alleyway for the return trip home, I made one final stop at an out-of-the-way notions shop I'd been to before. Actually, I was there so frequently, the owner greeted me like I was family. Pushing through the door, Shannon saw me as I entered and smiled widely.

"Adrien!" she greeted. "Perfect timing, I was just about to email you."

"It came in?" I asked as I set my bags down in front of her small counter. Rows and rows of tiny bins were behind her holding all sorts of sewing accessories, from pins, to needles, to bobbins for the most obscure of sewing machines imaginable.

"Yes it did," she smiled wider. "Hang on, it's out back."

I watched as the grey-haired proprietress disappeared through colorful curtain and then reappeared a moment later with a plastic box. Placing it on the counter, she located a clasp on one side and deftly flipped it up, then did the same on a companion clasp on the other end. Swiftly she lifted the top off from the base to expose a soft-pink colored sewing machine; it was sleek and streamlined, with all of the usual appointments – and one extra. There was a tiny built-in LED screen that lit up at Shannon's touch.

"This is the third generation," she said proudly. "Pre-loaded with hundreds of stitch patterns and capable of being fully autonomous." Pointing to a small hatch, she popped it open to expose two jacks. "Interfaces for PC and Mac, and it comes with a design studio software package for customization."

Sliding open another hidden area in the base, she smiled. "Auto-threading of up to sixteen spools of thread, totally interchangeable at the touch of the button. But it also has the one thing you were looking for as well – and I can't tell you how hard it is to find now."

I smiled. "The full manual mode?"

"Exactly," she said as she closed it back up and slid the top back over the machine. "You're a smart boyfriend to know that's something she would appreciate."

Smiling wider, I nodded; I'd paid very close attention to how Marinette used her favorite – and now long-in-the-tooth – sewing machine in the small studio I'd set up for her in the apartment. I was also aware that she had consented to making Alya's wedding dress (on top of her own gown for the wedding), and knew the poor device was just as overwhelmed as my fiancé was about to be. The automation would help with some of the drudgery work, for sure, but knowing Marinette, she would prize the ability to handle the most delicate work on her own. For once, having grown up in the fashion industry and knowing the tools of the trade had come in handy.

"It's purrfect," I said.

"Sorry?"

I started. "It's absolutely what I was hoping for," I said quickly, trying to cover my verbal mistake. "I'll pay for it now, but can you send it to this address?" I asked as I scribbled the apartment down on the invoice she's put down beside the machine. There were more zeroes on the bottom line than I was expecting. "I know it's sooner than we had agreed upon, but I need to move up her gift a bit."

"Absolutely," she smiled and then paused. "She must be really special to you. Not many would go to these lengths to give the gift of specialized sewing equipment for a birthday."

"She's worth it and then some," I replied reverently. Looking down at my birthday surprise for Marinette, I smiled. It was a shame in a way that her special day was still a number of weeks away, but it just seemed right for her to have the best equipment available as she worked to make our friend's wedding as spectacular as she could. I retrieved my Black Card, and I handed to Shannon. "If you don't mind, could you wrap it as well? Something festive?"

"Absolutely," she replied. "Anything for my best customer."

* * *

It didn't take long to settle up with Shannon and then I was back in the sky again, once more clad in comfortable magical black leather and deftly balancing my wares as I trotted along the rooftops of the city. The machine wasn't _exactly_ a shot-in-the-dark gift, as I'd seen how Marinette had been gushing over some of the equipment my seamstresses had been using for the fashion show a while back. More than anything, I just wanted her to have access to the best, so she could do her best. But now I'd need to find something else for her birthday – assuming she didn't kill me after the new machine arrived.

Marinette met me on the balcony as I landed, leaning in for a kiss before taking a bag from me. "Success?" she asked as we walked hand-in-paw toward the kitchen.

"On many fronts," I smiled.

She paused at the counter and looked at me slyly. "Why do you look like the Chat that ate the canary?"

"Moi?" I said innocently as I set down my bags and then scooped her up into my arms, smiling slightly at her adorable squeak as I caught her. "I have no idea what you are referring to."

Forgetting how limber she was, I was quasi-surprised when Marinette easily leaned up in my arms and kissed along the edge of my collar, then leaned further over to a human ear and whispered: "I have ways of making you talk, kitty."

"Do your worst!" I cried out good naturedly as she pulled my face closer by the bell.

"That is my intent," she said softly, eyes dancing with merriment before she nibbled below my chin.

"Good…" I purred, well aware of how my feline body was responding to her. "But if you don't mind, I need to get to _that_ bag over there first…"


End file.
